She Saved Him, He Saved Them & He Saved Everyone
by geraldineamoeba
Summary: AU. An off-putting, cold student enters E Class & the story shows the OC's dark, twisted life. A certain classmate, hellbent on figuring people out & pushing buttons in amusement, wants to discover her secrets. But as he becomes increasingly aware this task is more difficult than he originally thought, he ends up finding something he wasn't looking for: Love&Compassion. KarmaxOC
1. Chapter 1

1

She knew her grades were horrible. She shouldn't of slacked off last semester.

She knew getting a job was going to be her downfall in school.

 _But what else was I supposed to do?_

Her mom didn't have a lot of money, and the household they lived in was beginning to cripple in debt, alongside other issues that had been going on for years.

If it wasn't for her acquaintance, Isogai, who had helped her get a job at the restaurant he worked at as kitchen staff, her mom and herself would be living in a homeless shelter, running themselves into the hole further that her father had dug for them, rather than keeping their small home... on the poor side of town.

She had heard Isogai had fallen to E Class, he had gotten caught having a job by one of the school's administrators. She didn't want that to become her fate, she studied so hard, but she was just too tired from working, dish-washing, the only thing that they employ her as... legally.

Odd jobs she worked on the weekends however?

Seeing the owner of the restaurant had other businesses, and on the weekends was willing to pay under-the-table for hired help, she reaped all the extra cash she could.

But, through the week, at the end of each night as the dishwasher, (she worked night shift, it was all she could do with her school schedule through the week), it left her dirty, exhausted, and dropping down in the class ranks like a butterfly with a hole in it's wing.

She'd first went from B to C.

That had been a wake up call.

She then tried to force herself awake, to study harder and harder after her job/jobs, even taking energy drinks to stay awake.

She'd just crash and realize she'd fallen asleep on the top of her desk.

Now lo and behold, she had fallen just like Isogai... to the dreaded E Class in less than four pitiful months.

Isogai made it out to be 'not that bad', as he had put it, but the school mascot and everyone else said otherwise. She never wanted to judge a book by it's cover, aka the populace's opinion, but... this was different, this was her fate, a fiction novel.

She knew it was bound to happen. Even though, it was because of her own stress, anxiety, and just life in general, unlike Isogai who had simply been 'just caught'.

When she had secretly watched her mom cry silently in the night, her mouth covered to hide her wails, holding teared-up bills in her hands, droplets soaked in all over them, she knew. Her mom's job hadn't given her the promotion at the garment factory, were she sewed clothes on an assembly line.

It was that moment, after the divorce she paid for, that Zumi decided what was right, and more important. It was to take matters into her own hands, to uphold a sense of strength, and make a choice. What was more important? Her mom's life as a whole, or her grades?

Weren't grades apart of her life?

If they couldn't afford to pay for her school though, then what?


	2. Chapter 2

2

It was her first day heading up to that long mountain trail to E Class. She heard the building was in terrible condition, but when she arrived, honestly, to her, it really didn't seem that bad.

Coming from someone like her, whose kitchen currently had a bucket to catch a leak, this place was much more nice. She was sure the bathrooms here didn't have rusted pipes, mildew on the walls, or broken floorboards either.

"Welcome Zumi. I'm Karasuma." She learned he was the athletic instructor. "I've already filled you in on what's going on here... somewhat."

She quirked an eyebrow at that statement. She was very astute for a 15 year old.

 _Somewhat? What's that mean?_

"Come with me to the teacher's lounge, there's some documents you need to sign."

She followed, and soon he stopped in front of her and easily pushed the door open, and inside sat a beautiful blonde woman with big blue eyes. Foreign.

"Another new one eh?"

 _Another? Just how many get admitted to the E Class?_

"Yes, she needs to fill out forms."

He pulled out a chair and she sat on it, it wasn't very gentlemanly, rather just kind of haphazard, the way he manhandled the chair made it's legs squawk across the hardwood.

The blonde lady just ignored his flatness.

 _Perhaps it just is the way he was. Serious._

Soon, a filing cabinet snapped shut, and Zumi turned from just looking at the wall clock, quiet the whole time, staring at the ticking hands as if into space, until Karasuma sat a large stack of freshly printed papers down in front of her, all paper-clipped together into different segments.

Her eyes widened.

 _Just what the hell... is going on here?_

She already had enough issues!

Karasuma sat adjacent to her on the left. He was quite a looker, but also that large stack of paperwork... Covered in small print. It was more than she bargained for.

Isogai had said E Class wasn't that bad.

 _What was Isogai's definition of 'not bad' then?_

In her opinion, this was her last chance, before getting kicked out and sent to a school of lower status. She'd sign whatever papers she had to just to stay in school, to at least still keep the prestigious education. Had to. What would she do without a high school diploma?

 _I have this bad of grades and I'm just in upper middle school!_

She watched the black-haired man sort the papers as her mind filtered with thoughts of grades, tests, and black robes. The slogan she wanted to write on her hat upon graduation was a quote from her father: "You're a rat. You'll never make it." She wanted to have it all crossed out, a huge strike-through all of it. Then below it in even bigger letters: Guess you were wrong.

That thought alone prompted her. She needed to stay in school. Things needed to get better! She'd find a way graduate with honors from middle school and high school.

 _You wait and see! You asshole!_

He finished. "Okay. This first paper here details what exactly is going on here in great detail."

 _Exactly?_

She stared at the stark white page. He laid it directly in front of her, and picked it up carefully and began to read.

Slowly the two teachers watched a jaw slowly unhinge from an upper lip, a face becoming a well-spring of hot lava, red at the cheeks.

A throat squeaked out as if it hadn't drank water in a week: "NANI?!"

The lady snickered.

"The professor?! IS?! WHO?! ARE... you?" She rounded a horrified look at the handsome man's ever so serious face. Appalled.

His strong hand landed on her shoulder, as if to caress. "Yes Zumi."

She was so panicked, and caught of guard, (for the first time in awhile), she didn't feel anything. Not even his hand on her shoulder.

"HOW?! This... it's MADNESS!"

"Stop yelling." The woman remorselessly let slip. "It was a deal made by him and the government. The only way to save the Earth is to kill him like this. Here."

"So, my classmates... They're?! They're gunna?!"

She spoke up again. "That's right. If you don't sign it you won't get an education either. Do what the government wants if you want to continue studying here."

She was shocked! So harsh! Those words went right to the bone, Zumi's face, ice.

 _ALL OF IT! THIS IS INSANE!_

"How am I supposed to be involved in this?! I DON'T WANT TO KILL ANYONE!" She screamed standing, balling a fist into the table.

 _I JUST WANT TO GET MY GRADES BACK UP!_

She frowned so bitterly upon receiving no reply; they were dealing with her the way a parent would deal with a bratty four year old! Ignoring it.

"How am I supposed to contribute to this!" Her chin fell. "The world. If you're not lying..."

They both looked up at her then at that word, at 'lying', surprised obviously that she even thought they were.

For as ridiculous as a situation seemed, the girl hoped that they were straight up, cross fingers, cold-hearted liars.

 _How coy, how un-naive of her._ Karasuma's thoughts waved. "Then the world will end in nine months." Karasuma finished.

She fell to her seat. "Then what good is any of this?" Her tone took on a more shadowy tone. "It doesn't matter if I get good grades... then does it?" Zumi felt... Defeatedly pissed, aghast, disgusted. A multi-role feeling that seeped out of every pore all over her body.

"There's hope Zumi. Just sign then papers, and try out E Class. I have faith in the assassination."

The blonde woman's perfect mouth kind of lop-sided itself, from the PE's teacher's statement, then it quickly and sharply snapped shut, and her eyes adverted once again into the foreign newspaper that she was reading.

"Fine." She smugly agreed. "But I'm here for myself, and for my mom's security, and that's it." She made arm motions to express that declaration as final.

No killing instincts of any class, no crazy professor, no assassin would hold her back from her dream, from her victory. From saving her mom and herself.

"You'll be taking part in assassination attempts soon enough."

Zumi poked a mean look at the woman, that statement just as crappy as the last. She sniffed off the icicle glare.

 _And...I don't like you._

* * *

The paper signing took nearly an hour with Karasuma going into great depth and Zumi having no choice except to listen.

He ushered for her to stand when complete. To go to 3rd period, to math, and to meet the professor, the target.

She internalized her displeasure, unhappiness. Feeling like a pawn, an angered pawn.

 _Why is it that in my life, somehow..._

They rounded the hall.

 _that somehow I'm always in the hands of someone else? At someone else's mercy._

She looked out the windows into the beautiful day.

 _Every. Damn. Time._

She had too much she was tied up into now to deal with this kind of bullshit. Her vulgarity, brashness she mostly kept inside her head, but her course nature always was what got her through. It was unabashed, flooding out on occasion if cornered.

 _I seriously, seriously. Don't need any more problems._

Too many emotions caused her brain to melt, for her to go inside herself for a vacation. To a state where she just looked complacent on the outside. Blank. But inner turmoil blew storms through her body, especially as they approached the room.

A familiar clam up of her body.

Expectation of the absolute unsure. Insecurity.

A paper had just told her that her safety as a student was going to be upheld by this monster! A MONSTER!

No types of paper made her ever feel secure, not for a long time. She remembered the last time she put her hope in paper.

Her father had came back to the house after her mom placed a restraining order on paper.

Paper wasn't worth it's weight in shit.

They stopped at the door. Her anxiety peaking. Shivers.

 _I... I._

She could feel it coming on. A panic attack.

 _I need a smoke!_

"It's okay. Just walk in."

She didn't move. Her body slowly freezing.

 _The panic! No!_

It was the one thing about herself that she truly hated. Her inability to control them.

The door creaked open.

To control the panic attacks.

 _I gotta calm down! Smoke!_

Her mind screamed as loud as her own voice inside her.

Squalling chalk stopped.

"Welcome!" A loud smiley face with a huge grin greeted.

Her chest pounded, heart in one beat flipped itself, feeling like she was going to pee herself she got so frightened. Her stomach cued her to vomit, but nothing came.

"WHAT THE FUCK?! WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT THING?!" She squealed, cursing.

She felt a solid chest pushing her forwards from behind, Karasuma obviously, and she turned to latch onto his jacket, so terrified that she was unable to do anything except to latch on, her heels trying to get a grip on the flooring so she could somehow stop the train and grind it to a halt.

Her immediate thought was to jolt, but she was so scared, her legs were jelly, and she hadn't realized she'd dug her fingers into his inside pockets and rip away at his blazer in revolt.

He pushed her to where she wasn't but three feet from that... _THING!_

"Why, my! Don't be shy my dear!" It exclaimed rather joyously, turning striped with green from her comment. But his tentacles still held a welcoming posture, as if to say 'it's okay.' "Introduce yourself to the class!"

She said nothing. Heaving in the chest, eyes fixated on the sphere of a head. She'd forgotten all about the class attendees. Everything was hazy from panic, and all she could see was crayon yellow, the shade of the creepy skin. Trapped like an animal.

"Okay." Koro Sensei said. "Nurururhru. Well, if you won't introduce yourself, I'll do it for you!"

Karasuma turned her since she was still attached.

The whole classroom could see the visible terror.

"This is Yakujushi Zumi. She's attending E Class now due to poor grades. But of course, I'll do my best to fix that! Mr. Karasuma, can you help escort Zumi to her desk for now? It's in the back of the class to the right of Ritsu."

He nodded and practically drug her lifeless body to the desk, sitting her inside of it, and spacily, she stared up at him as he lumped her backpack on the floor.

"Please." She begged.

He shook his head, as if saying 'no no' to a small dog.

She was abandoned with this...

And the rest of the class...

 _These psychos._

 _Trained to kill psychos._

Why this one time, she thought it'd be different, that she'd be spared of something, of seeing, of doing something she wished she didn't have to do.

Some many events she wished she could of unseen.

Why she thought she could of begged. To plead. Like that would work.

No one ever saved her.

 _Never._


	3. Chapter 3

3

Somehow, not sure how, but it was the octopus' voice that had finally calmed her down. His voice, it was the only thing persistently droning through her haze, eventually it was enough to bring her mentality to a state of a more normalized reality:

It was just a monotonous voice, teaching math.

A masculine voice. No harm had come to her.

Her gray eyes rose to meet the back of a black-robed professor uniform. The octopus scribbled on about fractional equations on the chalkboard.

 _This asshole._

She watched his tentacles move in a passionate sort of way, expressive in using them to educate, to speak, to do practically everything. Even to take a drink of water from a glass.

Zumi was slowly becoming more perplexed as she watched his movements, her chin slowly rising from her previous fog.

 _This is the jerk that blew a hole in the moon?_

He looked harmless in a way, and his gesturing made her on edge. Perhaps that was his play, he played a fool, an innocent, and that was what he used to cover his killer instinct? With that smiley face head? So unnatural. So... unreal. His head was practically an emoticon. Perhaps this was yet another reason not to trust it, hiding his blood-lust with something generally seen in society as harmless?

She questioned in her mind. She sought to stare him down. Quietly.

 _This is the thing... that's going to end the world? Seriously?_

* * *

A certain red-haired boy who sat to her right spied it first. The rising.

He admitted that it was a treat to watch her scream out and cuss, utterly frightened, then hauled to her desk and abruptly dumped. He had wanted to laugh so remorselessly at her failure to save herself.

But he hadn't.

How weak it had been for her to meakly cry out to Karasuma! Like a little baby bird.

The only reason he held back his laughter was because of Koro Sensei's glare. Right at his face. He never obeyed anyone, but as his mouth opened and that huge smiley face stared right at him, he knew full well what was going through the sensei's mind.

Karma snapped his jaw shut. Koro Sensei had a plan to teach her, and the sensei didn't want her first experience in E Class to be one of mockery. If he was to get in the way of Koro Sensei's educational plan for her, he'd definitely get backlash. Perhaps in the means of hair spray and a snazzy new haircut, seeing as that was how the professor liked to torment him, with flat out embarrassment.

He had even painted his nails at one point in time.

Sensei nodded at him and swiftly turned around, back facing the class again to start a new chapter.

The sensei saved Zumi from him prodding at her... for now.

A little movement stirred his eyes from his textbook. Karma shifted his eyes peripherally, meeting her shoes first, and working up her legs, to her torso, then to her face, where her eyes began to blink, slowly, as if waking from a dream.

Her eyelashes fluffing so delicately upon her lower lids as she blinked.

She was thin, like a little sick flower, her eyes now finally just beginning to bloom.

 _Ah. So, you're awake now?_

Unmoving, he didn't want her to be aware that he was watching. She'd floated back. So, this experience had shocked her, panicked her. Karma observed her details, scrutinizing.

* * *

She hated having panic attacks.

They had started because of her father.

Peeking up at the backs of the heads of the class for the first time, her mind started to come to about them. Her eyes jolted around, one by one at them.

 _What a bunch of rejects!_

She well, was a reject now, because of the falling to E Class... but these students?

 _They really are._

Quite a few of them had thier hair dyed weird colors. One of her new classmates had his blue hair up in buns... like a girl.

 _Is he gay?_

* * *

 _Aw. She's looking at everyone._

Karma observed her. He was surprised, and he couldn't help a tiny trickle of a smirk appear on the right side of his mouth, hiding it.

Her literally watched her watch them, glares going from one student to the next, and the way she did it was one by one. Slowly, he could tell she was individually taking them in, their outward appearances. Eyes moving floor to head on each one, assessing, obviously thinking in her mind, inside herself. Forming her first opinions.

He wondered what she was thinking of Nagisa. Her eyes bubbled to the left at him, and had stayed on him the longest out of the whole class so far.

This girl.

 _Observant._

Zumi then noticed that the silent word had spread around the class that her head was up.

The red head realized it was mostly the boys, a few girls.

 _Of course. Getting a look in, aren't we?_

Something stunned him. It was the eye contact she made with Isogai.

Long.

A strange look crossed her face, as Zumi's gaze flashed at Koro Sensei, then back at Isogai's weary, down-turned frown.

He noted that she must know him.

* * *

Isogai had said E Class wasn't that bad.

Of course, from the documents she had to sign, she gathered why he wasn't able to tell her anything. Secrecy of the mission here was on government lock down. But still...

He got the picture from her look. Her eyes narrowed at him darkly, and he snapped back to the front before sensei noticed.

 _Isogai._

She sighed heavily. Rolling her eyes at the other boys' 'i'm trying to be nonchalant, but I'm not pulling it off well' looks, and apted to pulling out her notebook to draw.

 _Look at me if you want. Yes, yes, the new girl's snapped out of it._

* * *

So, she isn't interested that the guys are giving her attention.

 _Hmm, she's at least somewhat humble._

She dug a notebook out and a pencil.

Wait a second.

 _She stopped looking around._

Was it because they started all looking at her? That she gave up? How unimpressive. Honestly, he deeply wanted her eyes to of made it to the back of the class. She missed out on at least the last third of the class due to the other's noticing.

She hadn't noticed him, staring... yet.

Did she just get bored? Did she think that since what she was doing was figured out, that it was hopelessly compromising to look at the rest of the class?

* * *

She was quite good at drawing. For good reason. She drew inside her diary at home every night, usually drawing events that happened, or drawing other things.

The class noticed she had began to draw, and quit staring.

Her mind wasn't in a place to learn arithmetic. So she sat quietly instead, drawing a huge bat with giant fangs. It was actually quite impressive, she'd been working on learning to shade better with pencil.

 _That's it you losers._

She just concentrated her efforts into art.

 _Go on thinking that I lost interest._

She had been compromised.

She didn't want them to know that she had been looking at them, she wanted her thoughts to go unmatched with glares. She wanted to do it secretly, so she could spend as much time on each one as she wanted, without them knowing, letting her eyes fall and rise over their forms one by one. Sizing them up.

She'd complete her solo mission at any cost. These 'assassins' 'classmates', there was no way she let them best her.

Hurt her.

She wanted that initial grasp on them, the pre-look into their characters.

She trusted no one, so she vowed to absorb as much initial outward data about them as much as possible. Zumi spied names on notebooks when she could, hair color, posture, how many notes each one took, colors of their backpacks, and if they were open, what was inside them.

 _Drawing... a perfect distraction._

* * *

 _How smart._

A basic tactic, but it had worked.

He watched her again, start to do as she was doing before.

She had noticed the class was beginning to note that she was looking around, but she didn't want that. For reasons he didn't know, he met all challenges face-first usually, kind of pushing and butting heads word-wise to create issues.

It wasn't the drama he liked, it was the tension. He liked fighting, so much that it had landed him down in E Class.

 _So you began to draw._

A ploy, to bore them again. To get them to look away. A silent lie, to make it appear that you've lost interest, when you really haven't.

Karma found this entertaining.

A cheap manipulation tactic albeit.

He watched her eyes poke around again, starting where she left off. From the angle, he could tell she was gathering information.

Decidedly, he wanted to intercede in her plan to irritate her. Maybe it'd piss her off.

His face turned into something devilish as he devised.

* * *

A small wad of paper right by her pointer finger, made a swish, just as she was about to hatch in some texture into the bat's body, then to move to the next person.

It had come from the right.

Her eyebrows furrowed.

 _Damn it._

She could of been sweating bullets right now. Her concentration was shot!

Glancing, the perpetrator came into focus. The one who had noticed what she was doing.

A guy her age.

He had a light tan. He gets outside some. No freckles. Not so much sun that it's marked on his skin.

Lanky. Fit.

Hazel eyes.

Her gaze met his. He had a plain smile on his face.

 _His irises are kind of yellow._

A rich hazelly-warm tone. Like buttercups softly blowing in the setting sun.

His hair was such a saturated red. Dyed.

Not a natural red, a salmony red.

He sat four-feet away.

 _My neighbor..._

Even though she would of preferred to of gotten a desk off to the side somewhere.

Or better yet.

 _Not at all._

 _So I could leave when I wanted._

Or even better... Just not being taught by this monster or in this position at the E Class at all.

* * *

Karma put on the plainest look he could.

He pulled her from her 'studies' of his classmates.

Instead of doing what he expected: her looking flustered, maybe giving him an angry glare, to give him something to go off of, to use against her later... she instead blandly stared right back at him. Unfazed.

She showed zero expression.

And as un-showing as her expression was, so were her eyes in their adjusting in and out on his appearance.

He actually felt something hitch inside him.

It was the way she... stared.

She knew fully well he had caught her.

He knew she didn't care.

Was it that he had actually physically done something about it? That he had launched a note her way, which she as of yet, hasn't opened?

The others just turned around a few times to look. He had actually taken physical action.

When met with non physical protest, she resorted to manipulation to get what she wanted, when met with upfront conflict...

She faced it.

 _How unexpected._

She judged her battles, and chose from them which approach was the most appropriate.

He smiled now, brushing some of his bangs out of his face.

* * *

This salmon haired, smiling moron held up a notebook, on it written in a simplistic style, "What are you drawing?"

Zumi instead didn't respond, she moved her eyes around his face, and somehow, he seemed uncaring.

When done with that, she moved her steady orbs to his clothing:

A white stark shirt, unbuttoned at the top. The collar, and the top two buttons, exposing a bit of his chest.

Sloppy, or on purpose?

His black jacket was a suit jacket.

Black skinny jeans.

Black dress shoes.

Semi-casual.

This guy's family had money. His clothing was tailored.

No backpack.

* * *

She finally wrote on her portrait.

Inside he wanted her searching, scanning eyes to quit.

It had gotten... strange.

At first, as she stared at him, he felt a bit flush. She looked at him openly, accepting the challenge.

Their eyes met, and he realized, her eyes were the most gray he'd ever seen.

A white-washed, toneless gray. The opposite of his eyes. It was as if there was no color.

It was almost... sad.

Something stuck to him: As the middles changed, lessening the gray, widening the gray, her thoughts obviously racing, her mind filling with her assessment, it was the only thing that made her look alive at all.

She was thin, that he'd already seen, but she was also so pale, obviously not all the way Japanese, like him.

Maybe she was a fourth, like him.

Karma's challenge, had begun to take a turn on him. Those eyes, searched.

Taking in his outline.

They searched across his face, down his neck, at his unbuttoned top, and at the skin underneath, then down his torso.

Looking at his exposed skin, his clothing.

She was so...

 _Probing._

He couldn't let this turn on him.

* * *

She decided to go ahead and respond, letting her eyes finally fall away from him.

Obviously, and she knew, behind that smile, a sweet one that seemed a tad unnatural on his face, it had gotten awkward for him, her searching glares blew daggers at him, spikes of scrutiny.

He had kept his cool primarily, but it was one little shift in his posture, the one that caused him to change his blank look into a smile.

He had tried to smooth it over with a slick smirk, but she wasn't easily fooled.

When her eyes made it to his pants, trying to see if he was wearing a belt, which he was, a black leather one, with a silver buckle, and judging the size of his waist, trying to see exactly how fit he was...

If these peers were assassins, or at last training to be assassins, she wanted to know who was going to be slow. She wanted to know who was chubby. Speed was determined by two things: the fit-ness of someone's lower half. Their abdominals, glutes and legs.

She studied martial arts, it was basic knowledge.

That had made him uncomfortable.

He was a boy as a matter of fact.

She decided to give in.

 _I guess it's not like I'm revealing anything._

Not an address, phone number, or personal security numbers.

The way he sat in his desk gave her the impression that his guy was a slacker anyway.

She held up her notebook just enough for him to see the bat. 'A bat.' She had written.

* * *

His eyes narrowed at the small letters, and adjusted his posture to be sitting straight now.

He penned in his notebook again, glancing up front to the back of the professor, then back at the spiral notebook, before holding it up.

Clearly, he was interested in what she was doing, but didn't want the octopus up front to notice.

He knew the professor was secretly kind of a perv.

"Why that?" The paper said.

Maybe he could open her up with conversation, a simple tactic. He'd really was kind of interested, nobody in the class drew well, but he wanted to use the art to open up speech. Complimentary reverse psychology.

 _I'll say something nice._

Even though he actually did think it was quite decent.

 _And then... I'll get you to slip out info._

Inside him, devil horns prodded his guts. He'd get her to spill... something.

She wrote below the gargantuan bat. "Why not?" Upturning only the edge of her notebook, so he could see the simple statement.

* * *

He smirked, and she was able to see the edge of his teeth for a second, she could tell that response mused him.

 _Like I care._

She wasn't here for someone else's entertainment.

He lazily scribbled a few more words onto the random page below his math equations.

'It's really good. I like it.'

She just nodded.

* * *

He was unsure whether that nod meant that she was saying thank you, or whether it was because she couldn't accept a compliment.

Even a half honest one?

Maybe she just didn't care.

If she was flattered at all, in any sort of way, he'd monopolize on that that draw out answers.

She honestly, was a bit weird.

His concept of her had changed, upon entering he thought she was weak.

But as he watched her, he had realized she actually was quite an in-depth thinker, and extremely judgmental.

All quite cold.

He figured he'd try, she was a little humble he'd observed. She shunned away at the other guys... but he was Karma.

He scribbled and held it up 'Do you know Isogai?' He paired it with a smile of flattery.

Trying to please her eyes. He knew the E Class' girls considered him one of the top good looking ones in the class.

He wasn't below using his own suaveness to his advantage.

Being attractive after all, was quite a poker hand to hold, especially being an assassin.

Plenty of times he'd showed fake interest to get information out of girls. They were easy to play into his hands like putty. He'd just smile and whirl them and their little hidden secrets out of their mouths and around his fingers.

* * *

Her lip crunched in at that statement.

 _How observant._

Indeed. She'd going to have to watch out for this one.

He was too astute.

She wasn't interested in being blackmailed. If she told him yes or no, it wouldn't matter. Depending on this person's association with Isogai, he might be able to get information out of him without her knowing anyway.

He had spelled it clearly to her that he had seen the look she gave Isogai.

It's be an under-the-nose play, but it was possible.

She didn't know this one's level of discretion, how deep he'd allow himself to dig.

The digging alone was annoying.

What should she do then?

She just nodded.

That'll have to do. She confirmed only something he already knew anyway.

He can try to bombard Isogai with questions if he wanted, he wouldn't get that far. Isogai didn't know a lot about her. They were just acquaintances, and she made sure to keep it that way.

In asking Isogai about her, (if it was to happen), it might make this guy look like he was snooping or something else... like he was interested.

And that might be just enough of a barrier for a person not to start asking.

But that depends. If he was the type of person to be upfront about feelings, he could just lie his way all through it. Tell Isogai a lie, ('ohh I like her'), in an attempt to get him to spill, unfazed and uncaring about how it made him look.

But if he was a pretty boy, then she knew for sure, that his self image he wouldn't allow to crumble by asking about a female.

 _Now would we pretty boy?_

* * *

He took her nod with a small chin tilt, his bangs falling in his face, nothing but a simple acknowledgement.

 _Aww so she does._

Karma bet she was hoping that he'd leave her alone, and not to question her or Isogai period.

Hence her shut-off response.

Also, his poker-hand hadn't fazed her.

So... that wasn't something she was even entertaining in her mind.

Most girls her age did.

 _How grown._

She shut down the conversation after that. Body language just as icy as before.

He watched her continue drawing the rest of math, and much of social studies. Spying out of his peripherals again, here and there.

* * *

 _Let him look as much as he wants._

Let him act like he's spying.

 _I can still see you looking you salmon haired idiot._

She wasn't saying shit.

Nobody needed to know anything about her, or her's mom's life.

It was their business.

And only their business.

* * *

Koro Sensei suddenly swung around.

"Nrughghgh class! Time for Physical Education!"

All the students began closing their books, and Zumi stood too, stretching, snatching up her backpack.

Nobody attempted to advance. At least not yet. They would though, to try to get to know her.

She'd avoid it if possible.

Zumi ripped the bat out of her notebook, and smacked it down on Karma's desk, her palm slamming the picture down like she was smacking someone across the face.

Loud enough that it surprised everyone left in class.

She let her gray eyes storm down on his shocked wide ones.

That action he obviously hadn't expected.

"Since you liked it so well."

She heard the professor chuckle up front.

She had smacked her hand down purposefully loud. She wanted to get under his skin before she took off, a tactic to show him he didn't get anywhere with her.

 _You'll never win._


	4. Chapter 4

4

 _A few days later_

* * *

Physical Education.

She already did enough exercise while she was at her normal job as a dishwasher. Lifting all that cookware into the deep tri-sink was exhausting.

Not too mention good for the muscles. But still.

The worst part was, she was being made to do and forced to do physical exercise... and she wasn't getting paid for it.

To her, that was ridiculous.

At least they didn't receive a grade in Physical Education, Karasuma just wanted the kids to do it, and that was enough for him, of course he was training all the others in knives, parkour and assassin skills (which she had zero interest in).

She was way behind in these types of education because she had just been admitted to E Class.

What was annoying was Karasuma was determined to catch her up to speed.

Which was against her initial wishes.

She swore. Nobody. Listened.

She didn't care how much money was up for grabs over that octopus' head. It wasn't her money. She didn't claim it.

She worked for money.

For the money she earned.

On her own.

 _Everyone can kiss my ass._

* * *

"Okay partner up."

The groups naturally did and since she was the one that made the E Class uneven, (Ritsu didn't do PE due to being an A.I., which she thought was weird). Obviously the government was experimenting with other types of advanced machinery and intelligence here.

This class, what was it?

An experiment?

She just stood on the side not knowing what to do, and not really giving a crap either.

Aloof.

She really wanted to sneak off so she could have a smoke.

Vending machines in Japan let you buy cigs, nobody has to know your age, you just insert the money, and out pops your goodies.

The government tried to hack back on the amount in public, due to the high rate of underage consumption. They created a law that would limit the machines to only being workable in areas where they could be monitored, so lots of them were moved to clubs, gas stations, anywhere in buildings within good camera limits... But good thing, from time to time, her boss hands her a little slip of paper, with excess under-the-table jobs.

If it says she's gunna to be working at Blue Mark, then she'd go refill her stash that night off of tip money.

Not to mention she'd get free drinks also, which she wasn't against either.

If she pleased people well enough with her skills there, of course, that all depended on what role/duties 'The Boss' had her do for that night at Blue Mark.

Barback? Sheet Dancer? Waitress? Hostess? Private Table Entertainment?

She looked a bit older than 15, she was one of the lucky first developers; when a lot of other girls her age still were flat-chested, she had a B.

That makes for an easy lie.

Then of course, there's always the case she'd not 'Go Blue', as she energetically tag-lined it.

That paper could say fish docks or mopping at the restaurant.

She gritted her teeth.

 _I hate mopping that damn floor!_

"ZUMI! What are you doing standing there! JOIN A PAIR!"

She growled.

 _Damn that Karasuma!_

He was sparring with another pair, trying to work on some technical issues, when he had seen her out of the corner of her eye.

Suddenly near her a pair stopped sparring and ushered with their hands for her to come over.

"Hey! You! You can join us!"

That dude had a gritted, smiley grin on his face that sort of upturned her stomach. It only told her: 'boy, boy... I can't wait to get to know the new girl!'

She walked over like a slug. So slow, trying to waste as much time on her steps as much as possible, just so she could spend less time with this fool.

* * *

Karma stopped for a breather.

The artificial red-head swore he'd heard Karasuma shout something at the newbie.

He wanted to know what it was.

Probably just yelling at her to join in. He'd realized that she was actually quite lazy when it came to athletics, but she wasn't overweight by all means.

He waved his random partner off, everyday it was a different person, Karasuma did that on purpose so they could all learn from each other. Learn of individual strength and weaknesses.

Karma was panting from exhaustion, leaned over hands on knees, trying to catch his breath. He had soaked through his PE uniform tee.

"Uh thank goodness." Sugino panted. "I was out of steam."

"Okay. No worries. I needed a break too."

He lied. He could of went longer, Karma could of continued. He played. He wanted to see her actually join in.

This might be interesting.

He decided to play it as general interest, because if he was just staring, watching, Sugino would notice.

"Look." He smacked Sugino on the shoulder. He pointed, finally standing up, hands on his hips now.

"Huh?" Sugino turned.

"New girl's joining in." He smirked. Now this gave him the open availability to be able to watch without being faulted from others.

 _This will be interesting._

* * *

"I'm Terasaka!" He laughed loudly, horribly loud.

She shuttered at it.

"And I'm Nagisa."

She nodded. Eyes not meeting theirs.

They both acted as if they were unsure of what to say.

She preferred to remain silent.

"Okay... Uhmm." Nagisa stammered. The silence awkward.

Her arms were even crossed.

"We're uh, trying to learn some new postures for one on one attacks."

"Here you go." Terasaka handed her a weird green rubber knife with military markings. She didn't want it.

Reluctantly she grabbed the knife, and just stared at it in her hand.

In this P.E. class she might just have to be considered a dud, but she wouldn't care.

Terasaka looked at her, and gave a motion with his hand to start.

* * *

Karma chuckled. "Look at her glaring at Mr. Karasuma."

"Yeh." Sugino added. "I don't think she wants to do this."

"Obviously." Karma added. Crossing his arms.

* * *

Sometimes fuses don't ignite a bomb, and this bomb wasn't wired to explode.

Zero interest.

"So uh, come at me I guess." Terasaka said, scratching his head. He was fishing for words, he knew, and she could tell that he knew that she was disinterested in doing so.

He crouched down as if to brace for an attack. He didn't look threatening at all, honestly... Silly.

 _Was he really... an assassin?_

She sneered at him.

The way he had his hands up made him look like a cheap Bruce Lee knock off.

She'd easily seen the gang, Yakuza, beat up, whip the snot out of people whose stances were this off by simple brute force alone.

On the poor side of town, unfortunately, she got to see it all.

She studied some martial arts, but not traditional Japanese ones. She liked Thai forms better, that involved using thicker bones on soft tissue.

Maximum effect.

The crime lords of the underbelly used that. That was how she became interested at first, watching the street fights and seeing Yazuka knock a man in simple steps.

She had searched free books at the library, until she found a specific form that suited her.

Her and her mom needed protection, from her father... and her aunt.

If it was to be her, then she wanted the highest ground covered in the shortest amount of time, a quick take down.

* * *

"I don't think she's gunna do anything."

"Hmm maybe you're right." Karma remarked. Other groups were starting to stop and stare too. Just to see what would happen.

 _You're being put on the spot. Everyone expects you to participate. Now what are you going to do?_

He smirked.

* * *

"Well come'on!"

 _Boy, this Terasaka is ungodly impatient._

She could tell also by the bad dye job on his hair; the blonde underneath was done unevenly, and it cut up too acutely in into the top faux hawk in the back of his head.

 _What a loon!_

She surprised him as she threw the knife to the side, refusing to use it.

* * *

"She threw her knife on the ground. How lame." Karma chidded, eye-rolling.

"Yeh, but look!" Sugino stood now, brushing dirt off of his pants, pointing.

* * *

She lowered her stance, knees at strong right angles, next, her toes crunched into the dirt and small pebbles below her sneakers. She brought her elbows into her sides, and then fanned her arms out, snapping her wrists upwards and locking palms in a manner that if he would come at her, she easily had seven moves lined up that could take him down in fifteen seconds, maybe less, depending on what the oaf decided to do, depending on how good of balance he maintained.

The worst part was, she seen that salmon haired nut out of the corner of her eye.

Staring.

So was his partner, and so many others, as a matter of fact.

 _FINE! Let this be a lesson to you all!_

She followed the starting pose, it had been altered by her of course, over time, as she became more aware of what worked better for her body size. But she still forcibly, and strictly followed the rule: 'one palm facing East and towards the opponent to announce the rising sun, and the second palm Westward, seeking the setting horizon, to bring the victim to his fall.'

Zumi moved her hands once again, to form her palms and arms into the East West kata.

 _Now I'm ready._

* * *

That show of ready stance made Karma connect eyes with Nagisa.

From that line of vision, from across the field, he could see Nagisa backing up some.

He shook his head at Karma. As if to say 'yes, something's gunna happen'.

Sugino piped up. "Is she? Is she really gunna take on Terasaka?"

"Guess so." Hmpf. Karma put a wrist up to this lip.

 _Surely._

Underneath of his outward, fake, unassuming, cool stance, he was actually excited.

A huge opponent, Terasaka, a blunt force fighter, against one they'd never seen before. He didn't want to relay off his actual, real excitement.

He kind of hoped she at least could manage one hit on Terasaka, that would at least be some... _nice entertainment for this afternoon._

* * *

 _My dojo master would be proud._

She'd managed to maintain very good balance, and with his teachings, she'd expanded them.

She'd always honor his memory, by fighting for her mom and her own self.

Always in defense. Never with an intent to kill.

To protect, not to harm purposefully.

That was the code.

A code she refused to break with this classroom.

This was the only chance she'd have any time soon to show these dummies... that she wasn't to be messed up.

 _Especially to that red head._

Even though she may have some talents that she hides, purposefully, (kept hidden that she knows anything martial arts so she could protect that secret), she lacked interest in this uncouth charade.

Assimilation into the fold, and assassination was no interest of hers, and it caused her decide to divulge that secret.

 _Damn it._

Even if she'd have to punch it into their heads to get them to realize it.

She made sure that blonde lady who had been in the break room, was watching too.

She had indeed sat up from her lawn chair, sunglasses down.

* * *

"Nothing's happening."

"She's sizing him up probably."

"Hmm makes since."

* * *

She actually felt sorry for this Terasaka. He was going to be her patzi.

He lunged at her, and she easily side-stepped, and as his body passed, and didn't turn quick enough, she back kicked him instantly into the ground.

Then she swung her body to face him again, now on the opposite side. She snapped into a different posture, a taller one, right heel digging, left knee bent, but toe touching like a ballerina, claw on the left to grab, right to slash.

A posture she'd nicknamed 'Jungle Night'.

Her frame slim, a posture guaranteed to work against blunt force.

* * *

Karma chuckled. "Aww, she felt him out. She can obviously tell now Terasaka is a lunge first, think later."

"Nagisa is staring at us."

Karma looked. Nagisa's eyes were huge, and his head was again shaking in a 'yes' motion.

Karma could only imagine what that girl was speaking about over there, he wanted to get closer, but he didn't want to give off that much open interest.

* * *

The blue haired Nagisa kept looking over at the salmon.

 _They must be friends. Now I know something about you._

She smirked.

Terasaka stood wobbly, holding his back. "That kind of hurt."

"It better of hurt. I hit you square in the lower spine."

She remained un-moving as he grunted and got ready for another attack. "You'll have to teach me that sometime."

"No."

Nagisa then started shaking his head at that other one across the field.

 _Ahh I see, that one is using this one for insight. I better end this quick._

* * *

"That was crazy! You see that!"

"Of course I seen that Sugino."

"What you aren't impressed?"

Karma yawned. "Not yet."

 _Knocking the wind out of Terasaka isn't easy, good job little brat._

* * *

He lunged at her a second time, exactly the same as last, right straight down the middle, but instead went for an uppercut.

 _Very predictable skill set._

Her slim Jungle Night allowed her to step forward, which surprised him as he almost made contact with her face, (which was the point), to startle him, and that took him completely off guard. She ducked under his, more less superman uppercut which he'd used both of his fists clinched together for, and going with the natural flow of his movement, as he was one of the bigger classmates, she noticed, probably one of the biggest out of the boys, she took his juggernaut issue to her advantage and with her force, skyrocketed his fists into an awkward position high above his head.

For a split second he looked as if he was getting arrested by the police.

Until she smashed his own fists back into his face, from his own swinging centripetal force.

He was done. And bleeding, hunching over and taking a few steps back in disbelief, he waved her off.

 _Way to give up loser._

* * *

"Man!" Sugino shouted. "SHE GOT YOU TERASAKA!"

"SHUT UP SUGINOOOO!" He screamed from across the field like an ape.

Karma just started laughing hysterically.

* * *

 _It wasn't anything to cheer for. What idiots._

"Go get bandaged." Karasuma told him.

She did feel bad, he didn't really do anything wrong, and she had just used him as a tool for her own vindication.

Might as well get the vendetta out into the open.

"LISTEN UP!"

Anyone who was whispering shut it. Even the laughing shit bag calmed.

"You all want me to join you on this tireless charade, to kill that overgrown octopus... but I have NO DESIRE to do so! YOU HEAR THAT!"

She balled a fist, shaking it at them all.

"So don't go getting chummy with me! Stay away from me, and I'll stay away from you!"

* * *

 _How utterly cold._

Karma and Sugino started walking in like the rest now that the period was over.

He smirked.

After that display today.

 _How even more fun._

He watched her back, that light brown hair trailing in, up the stairs. Ahead of everyone else, obviously in a hurry to get a shower and get the hell out.

 _You insist so eloquently that you want nothing to do with this. I wonder why that is?_

He smirked.

 _Especially_ _with the skills you have._

"I'm not making friends with her anytime soon." Sugino commented watching her go the opposite hall towards the ladies locker room.

 _Hmm, then your playing right into her hand. That's exactly what she wants._

He wasn't going to do that. He wouldn't give it to her.

Nobody told Karma what to do.


	5. Chapter 5

5

"God damnit Yaruji! I told you not to put this fucking hot ass pan of grease into the sanitizer!"

"Ohhh sorry there Zumi." A man almost in his forties spoke to her like a child. "Gosh... I'm just such a dope sometimes!"

He began rolling in laughter.

It made her sick

 _Great._

Now she'd have to drain and unclog the sink!

"I hate you." She stuck her arm down in the water which was about congruent with the actual length of her arm.

Grease floated to the top of the water.

"Aww you know you love me." Yaruji snicked on, walking out the open back door, tossing his apron to hang on a peg.

It missed and just fell sloppily on the floor.

He never put his greasy pans where she wanted him to!

God! Did nobody listen?!

She flickered the switch on the CD Player, at least she got to control the music... after they left. She memorized what albums on the old-school early 2000's Walkman 5-changer she'd placed in there.

Tonight was a #3 night.

Korn.

She scrubbed away as she listened to the American Nu Metal, they banged their guitars the way she wanted to bang Yuruji over the head.

 _Seriously? How disrespectful!_

What a typical run-of-the-mill macho-ist stink wad. Literally.

By the time the douche was off of work, she swore he smelled so rank that he'd been secretly farting inside his pants all night.

What was odd was it that it seemed like nobody else in the whole kitchen noticed, or maybe they just didn't give a damn.

Who knew?

She began to sing Twisted Transistor in English with the song, it was the only music she liked, heavy rock, metal music.

It was dirty and grimy, like the life she lived. She also liked Dir En Grey, an actual Japanese Nu Metal band, she swore someday, when she came out of this, when her and her mom could get out... when the bills were paid, when the they got the house back, when they rose out of credit card debt... she'd go to a concert!

"Hey you, hey you." Then she hummed, then scrubbed. Then sang, "Alone, ly life... where no one understands you. But don' give up, 'cuz the music do." She hummed again, "Inside you, forever preaching. Fuc' you too. Your screams a whisper."

"Hey!" Isogai popped out from behind the open hole in the wall over by the main line. "Heard your music. I knew you were still here."

She turned it down a tad, getting the player wet a bit.

"Uh, I forgot you were still here Isogai."

The hole was where the chef sat completed platters for tables so the waiters could gather their orders for the customers.

"I don't know how you listen to this stuff."

"What?" She responded. Her black tee short was covered in nasty grease and food entrails, soaked through. The she got it suddenly. She was so concentrated on that damn pan. "I just like it."

He noticed. "Rough night eh?"

 _Why is he being so...?_

Isogai she'd talk to if she had to. Her was her co-worker all in all.

Coming Undone, another Korn song from the mix she made came on.

At least he'd helped her get the job. She never told him much, and any open-ended questions she'd shut down, but she'd at least chat, sort-of, to pass time.

She'd try anyway. She wasn't much of a 'conversationalist' as they say.

"Yaruji threw in the grease pan again." That'd be a good enough explanation in being wet, and my frustration. Typical work issues.

"Yeh... Sorry." He said rubbing his neck, yawning. "So... What'do you think of E Class?"

That was the wrong question.

"I understand you couldn't tell me anything due to it being classified."

He crossed his arms over the gateway into 'Heaven' as she called it. She called the kitchen the 'Netherworld' to entertain herself.

"Yeh." He sighed.

"I just want to study... and be left alone."

"Did you have to use Terasaka to prove a point though?" His light brown eyes searched her wet form for a response.

She just turned on the hot tap, letting the grease melt off of the pan inside the sink. She wiped her face on her sleeve. "Had to somehow."

"Well, I think you broke his nose."

She chuckled. "Nah. I know I broke his nose."

Isogai just sighed and rolled his eyes at her harsh response, he'd worked with her awhile so he knew how to deal with her. "I admit, Terasaka is kind of an idiot, and with this training we should be able to take a hit, but damn..."

Her eye jolted up to meet his lounging form. He never cussed.

"But you really got 'em good."

 _I must of impressed him somehow._

Cool. Wait. Not cool. It didn't matter.

"Yep." She watched the grease loosening.

"Look, here's the deal." He unbuttoned the collar on his shirt and loosened his work tie.

The song ended and changed to Korn's Somebody, Someone.

Lots of dead air between their responses allowing for much of the songs to pass.

She knew all the song titles, she looked at the player, it was making noise again, it was old, then at him, who was now looking directly at her.

 _Deal, what deal? What's he talking about?_

"Terasaka, is my friend, and somehow, I'm not sure how Zumi... but you messed him up. He's non-stop been complaining about his back. He's went and seen a chiropractor already, and had to go to the doctor to get his nose fixed."

She remained quiet as she listened, a few brown hair strands falling into her face, but then stopping due to sticking to her wet and sweaty forehead.

Isogai actually looked sort of upset. She never seen him upset. It threw her through a loop for a second, for such a calm person, this had really flustered him.

"You need to apologize."

"WHAT?!" Her mouth fell open amongst the hot steam.

"Yes. I'm serious." The player started into the chorus of the song, heavy guitar banging. "I'm not telling you to. I know you don't like being told what to do, at least that much I've gathered. I'm just suggesting. He's your classmate, and he became your victim. Do you have no remorse?"

She sucked in a deep breath of air, and let it out, closing her eyes.

 _He's not wrong._

"Just, just think about it okay? I know you don't play nice with others, but if you can't do it for yourself, because you feel justified somehow, at least do it for me. I helped you get this job Zumi, and I know we aren't friends, but Terasaka is my friend. If you've got any sort of thankfulness for what I did for you... Just think about it."

She nodded and he moved away from the window. She didn't get to ask him how it had been in 'Heaven' tonight. It was busy, she was sure he'd made decent tip money.

Before he left out the front, she heard him holler, "Be Safe!"

 _That Isogai._

He was too good of a person. So sweet and concerned for others.

Honestly it grossed her out. Everything, everyone in someway, she found something she hated or disliked.

 _Most people, all people... honestly. Yuck._

She was least attracted to sweetness, her aunt was the 'sweetie' of the family, a false one.

But she could see how girls at the main campus still sent him love letters.

 _Love letters. Also, yuck._

Isogai's sweetness was truthful though.

She let the heat of the sink envelop her face, clean steam from the faucet as she scrubbed busily on fart man's grease pan.

Yet another song came on. Korn, Make Me Bad.

This one was a favorite. They were all her favorites, but this one was a favorite among favorites.

She started singing again. In pretty good English. Her English had improved dramatically once she started getting into American music a couple years ago.

"I am watchin' rise and fall of my salvat...vation." she still stumbled on a word from time to time. "There's so much shi' aroun' me and such lack of compassion."

Isogai had her pinned. He knew she didn't care, but her used her job as an advantage.

A grounds for her to apologize upon.

She certainly had no concern who Isogai liked or disliked...

 _Unless it was that salmon haired twit._

We weren't friends, so it didn't matter. But as far as her job?

"I feel the reason, as it's leavin'. Me? No not again." She sang, half humming. "It's quite deceiving, as I'm feelin' the flesh make me bad."

 _Deceiving_ _!_

The perfect word to describe just what happened ten minutes ago!

She hated being turned into a pawn!

She ground her teeth, and finished up now scrubbing down the sink.

For as smooth and buttery as he appeared, Isogai was quite the wheeler and dealer.

 _Fine!_

 _Apology it was!_

But she wasn't falling for the trap. She'd do it on her own accord, on her own grounds. On her own terms.

 _I have to make sure my previous claim still stands._

* * *

She got home later that night.

Unknowing that somebody had been watching her in the shadows.

* * *

Thank god, it was a weekend tomorrow. Saturday. A much needed break, until work at Blue Mark later in the evening.

 _Maybe I'll actually get some studying in._

October 15. She penned in the journal she'd pulled out from under her bed frame:

'They told me to keep it classified, so I can't write even in here what's going on there. Not even to cover my own ass as my mom wants me to do. To save her ass also.'

She smirked, her mom had the tendency to be just as vulgar. She continued to write.

'Seeing my new sensei I can say, brought me to a panic attack a few days ago. I haven't had once since the last time I thought I seen dad.'

She grumbled, rolling on her stomach to write, rather than Indian style, her now clean hair swishing around.

Zumi took a bit of time drawing the wooden classroom building.

'All wood, 27 students, well, 28 now... and one that doesn't participate in anything.' (she meant the A.I., Ritsu). (Author's note- This was before Itona.)

She continued. Captioning it. 'Pretty typical old school building. Weird teacher. Weird students.'

She drew some of them that stuck out. Labeling them.

'Blue hair, Nagisa. Isogai. Terasaka. Blonde Chick. Karasuma. Ka... ka?'

She couldn't recall the aqua haired girls name, but she noted her because of her uncanny niceness.

On the next page, she flipped over, she sighed.

With a devilish look, she began to draw another portrait, a full page one.

She pulled out her colored pencils to see if she had the right color.

A particular color, that was quite hard to spy. She didn't have it. She decided to mix orange and red, harshly scratching the red over orange to mix them.

She drew bangs, only ever so slightly, covering brazen yellow-y eyes. Adding a darkness under his hair for shadow, and she added in a nose, erased a few pieces until it was close, an fairly good in resemblance. Leaving his mouth with a stupid smirk.

Caption. 'Calling this one Salmon. Hair Color pun. He's too nosy, I can already tell.'

She wrote a final end to the journal entry.

'Isogai wants me to apologize for breaking Terasaka's nose! haha! Too bad it wasn't his heart!'

Zumi laughed crazily after that, she swore, she cracked herself up!

She was full of it. Tired and running off of zero sleep.

Tossing the book and shutting off the light, the only one in the house, as her and her mom worked opposite shifts, she spoke out loud, getting under the blanket.

"That'll be the day. I'll do it Monday. Fine Isogai, I'll apologize."

She stared at the ceiling, hands behind head, house fully locked, drifting off.

"heh hehh, 'to bad it wasn't his heart!'" She quoted herself, chuckling, then passing out shortly after.


	6. Chapter 6

6

She popped a smoke.

Scratching a match, lighting it then gingerly tossing it to the side.

Taking an off-the-path route to the school building, one through cheap-side, poor town, to avoid vigilant eyes, she took in that first big inhale of smoke with ease.

 _Ahh._

The first one always felt so good. A head rush of sleekness from the air escaping her from being pushed in the corners, inside her lungs, by the devilish tar. She had been having some anxiety that morning.

Zumi knew exactly why.

It was Monday.

"Oui!"

"Hm?" She slowed, not stopping of course, as someone hollered. She'd never stop. It wasn't smart. If she did, she knew she'd better ready her mind for a fight, being involved in something that she might not like entirely. Her head instantly snapped to the right over her black leather jacket's motorcycle collar.

Alert.

It was October and it was beginning to get cold, the other ones in her class had just began to bring jackets too, and this happened to be the only one she owned.

Her mom had gave it to her. It used to be her cousins.

"You gotta smoke?"

He had came up on her, not fast, but quick enough that she snapped a cig out and was able to toss it his direction.

The man caught it in a rather slouch-slack posture, for a second, almost looking like he was going to lose it and drop it in the puddle by his feet.

He pulled a black lighter out of his pocket and lit it, taking in that first suck as well, then catching up to her.

"So."

Younger, but older than her, probably twenties, having a similar cut like Isogai's.

She betted she knew exactly what he looked like without clothes on.

Covered in tattoos.

"Yeh." She stated. Taking the cigarette out of her mouth perching it between her right fingers, flicking off the ash.

"You already know." Dressed in all black.

 _Just leave me alone douche bag._

She nodded.

At her displeasure, she was forced to speak with him.

"Damn." He looked her up and down. "Goin' somewhere nice?" His smile was sweet as sugar. The way he smoked made her fingers curl and twitch, it had that sort of irritably 'too cool'-ness to it that seemed fake. The niceness was not real. Just like so many other assholes in her life, that she wished would just go away permanently.

"I'm in school?" Her answer snarky.

"Ahhh. That you are."

"Seriously?" She rebuked his attempt.

He just laughed.

"We'll have the money by this Friday."

"Well. No need to get snappy girl." The man waved his finger childishly.

She finished the cigarette off, sucking on that last hint of tobacco before the filter, tossing the butt on the ground, and stamping it out. She stopped at the end of the alley, and turned.

He stopped also.

"Friday."

He nodded, and stepped back. She took a step backward and onto the main sidewalk, a newer one from the grimy alley, and began to walk away.

The man just watched from the dim, roof covered area she came out from, leaning on the wall, smoking.

 _No more Yakuza territory._

"Couldn't come soon enough."

That was the quickest smoke she'd ever had.

* * *

It was lunch time at in 3-E.

While some of the class apted to heading into town to grab a quick noodle at some of the shops closest to the mountain, some hung in the classroom and paired their desks up, unpacking plastic tubs from their portable lunch packs.

She never had lunch.

She always ate leftovers from work, whatever Boss Man let her have.

It was usually only one meal a day. It sustained her, so she considered it fine, but she did hate the fact that her meals were on someone else's bill, but when you don't have money to even feed yourself, you've gotta do what you gotta do.

Her mom didn't have a fridge.

Nor any of the other major appliances... how would she store a lunch? Keep it from spoiling?

Terasaka sat on the other side of the room.

Zumi sighed, standing, feeling uneasiness inside her whole body. The last time she apologized was to her father, and she had made sure that that was the last time.

Terasaka had been eyeing her all day.

 _Probably because I knocked his nose in._

He obviously was upset about it. He seemed kind of like a macho man. Maybe his mind also wandered in what she was going to do next?

Currently he was jamming a pork bun in his face, carefully avoiding bumping anything too painful, sitting inside a group of other boys from the class.

As she approached them, she could feel some of the class' eyes on her.

 _Salmon._

God her prejudiced bias against him flared!

 _Did he have to be here?_

They also all in unison stopped mid chew to halt their food intake rate down to a slow calculated munch, on watch like hawks.

Zumi, when close enough, then realized whatever doctor Terasaka had seen, did a fine job of plastering up his nose; clean white bandages spread across his face made him look so alien.

"Hey. Terasaka."

His eyes widened.

She didn't have to look to know Isogai was staring at her back from the other side of the room... watching.

 _Probably smiling._

"Look." Her voice lowered, instead of being brash like she had yelled out on the field, she softened it down so that he could express her words in a more digestible form. "I..."

* * *

Karma turned from sitting with a few of the girls and Nagisa.

He wasn't the only one, the others in his lunch group had too.

"What's going on?" Nagisa hushed.

Karma shrugged.

* * *

Isogai's eyes widened.

"Look, you see..." She fummed. "I uh..." She flashed Isogai a quick glare.

Terasaka was frozen.

* * *

The redhead saw it.

Then he knew.

He couldn't help but smirk.

* * *

"Uh. Well."

He looked uncomfortable.

"I'm... I just." She breathed in and out a little to heavy. "I realize that it was unfair of me to use you like that, and..."

* * *

Karma watched Isogai's eyes widen.

 _Oh I see._

In that moment, something was going on.

Isogai was too animated.

Something had been discussed.

His hazel eyes slowly floated back... she was fumbling over words.

* * *

"I'M SORRY!"

It came out as a loud shout.

Terasaka jerked his head as if the the actual words held gravity that had pushed him back abruptly.

She started to sniffle.

* * *

Nagisa quirked an eyebrow, and as his eyes moved to Karma's face, Karma actually seemed stunned.

The scream was most unexpected!

It should of been the apology itself, but instead, it was the delivery that caused everyone left in that lunch room to turn their attention.

Especially him.

 _Why?_

* * *

Horrible memories flooded into her head, specifically the first time she stood up to her father.

She, a young girl of only 12, had told him to stop it with her mom.

 _'Back up, or I'll!'_

 _'Or you'll what Zumi?'_

 _He reached for the gun._

 _'It's not loaded.'_

A dumb childish mistake.

All she knew at the age was that guns can 'protect' people, she didn't know you had to load the bullets in it to get it to work!

 _He wrenched the gun out of her hand._

 _Smacking her over the side of the head._

She had been so stupid! Thinking that a gun would 'just shoot' on it's own!

But how'd she know?

She just stood there... everyone in the class silent as they watched her cry.

She'd taken a vow that night to learn martial arts for her and her mom's protection, not for killing. One that didn't involve weapons that'd kill a man.

But when she meant it, hurting someone in protection, she swore to herself it was for a good cause and she wouldn't say...

 _Sorry. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry daddy!_

* * *

Sometimes his brain worked in overtime, and now was one of those moments.

So fast that he would spend a majority of the class caught in a net, a train of thought that on the outside, made him look like he was staring off into space.

It was why he looked so lax in class, his mind was working and moving so intensely to a level that others could only dream of facilitating.

Absorbing surroundings, sounds, the lessons themselves, Koro Sensei and his breathing and movements (for assassin purposes), his classmates reactions to the lessons, a favorite was watching Terasaka moan softly during science, it was just so obvious, that was what was hilarious.

Terasaka hated biology.

But now, that girl.

Zumi.

She kind of 'threw' him through this loop, not an actual one, but yet one all the same.

How fitting it was that she was here.

Yet another student that was admitted to E Class that just as weird as the others.

 _But weird how?_

If that crack of emotional outburst and her crying across the room right now wasn't enough to make him question, then the looks she once again gave Isogai certainly were interest spiking.

* * *

"Uh, well." Terasaka fought for words. Zumi looked so disheveled, and he never seen someone feel so bad. "It's okay."

His 'boyz' stared at him. And he then shifted his mood once noticing, to chuckling nervously in embarrassment. "I mean! HAHA! You uh..."

She looked up finally. Her face a mess, still crying.

"You didn't really hurt me that bad anyway!"

* * *

He admitted he discovered something new about his classmates not necessarily daily, but at least every few weeks.

But projects. He liked.

Being quite the people watcher, he knew body language, and this girl, everything about what she was actually saying and what her body was doing, were somehow, two different things.

It was all so closed, she turned to face no one, her feet towards no person.

Disinterested.

He watched her.

But now, even though closed, arms crossed across her chest, folded, she was shuttering in tears?

Something didn't make Karma quite believe that all of it was in true sorry-ness, in true flavor of feeling remorse.

Had she somehow forgotten that she'd done it all to prove a point?

 _How odd._

* * *

She knew he was lying to save face in front of his friends, even though their stunned looks they knew that he was bluffing.

"Well never... nevertheless." She squeaked. "It's, not... okay."

Zumi began to shuffle out slowly, out the side door, needing some air.

Just before, she rounded to say over her shoulder but just loud enough for the rest of the on-lookers to hear.

"Just because I feel bad, doesn't mean I'm any of you's friend..."

She sniffled.

"So, make sure and leave me alone."

She ran out.

* * *

Karma's jaw kind of loosened.

Even if she did apologize, she still made a point to state that she doesn't want to have anything to do with anyone!

He looked at the blank space she had just exited, while returning to the group, but not before making a quick, calculated glare at Isogai... Jaw-dropped. Visibly upset.

"I feel so bad for her!" Kaede squeaked out.

"An apology. I actually feel horrible for her too." Nagisa's eyes looked sad. "She took hitting him really harshly. I just wanted to go over and give her a hug."

"Yeh. I mean... she couldn't of hurt Terasaka that bad... right?" She looked over and watched him again lightly poke another pork bun around his nose rather sheeplishly.

"What d'you think?" Nagisa Asked Karma.

"Ahh. She's just a girl." The question brushed off with ease.

"What's that supposed to mean!" Nakamura spoke up from her lunch pail, her blonde hair thrown angrily behind an ear.

"I'm jus' saying..." Karma slyly fizzled, to get under her collar. "Girls... who knows." He slouched down rolling his eyes, his normal posture. That really wasn't the thoughts in his head, but he blew them off to the others by masking them with ignorantly toned statements.

He heard Nakamura growl. "You! Every time. I swear, you've always got something smart to say!"

"Ahh?" Karma sat up.

He spied Zumi walking down the path almost to the edge where the mountain cut off.

 _Going home early._

"Hmm?" Nakamura grumbled, looking too when she realized Karma had stopped talking, seeing her. "Obviously she's sorry." She crossed her arms.

Karma jolted up, throwing Nakamura off balance a bit.

"LOOK TERASAKA! THERE GOES YOUR NEW GIRLFRIEND!" Karma shouted suddenly, jesting, pointing outside to her.

Terasaka shot up instantly, throwing the uneaten half of his pork bun back into his lunch bag.

"SHE'S NOT MY GIRLFRIEND! I'LL KILL YOU KARMAAAAA!" He balled a fist. "Son of a, OW!" He hands jolted to hold his bandaged nose.

Karma started laughing hysterically.

"You can't even yell without it hurting!"

"SHUT UP!" Teraska grumbled out to him.

Karma just couldn't resist the urge to agitate the brute... especially when now he had an object he could tease him with.

"Of course, how'd I know?" Nakamura mumbled, taking a bite out of an apple. "Taking up the perfect opportunity to make fun of a gimp."

"Shut up Nakamura! I'm not a gimp!"

She growled, throwing her apple back into her pack. "Okay! So maybe that wasn't the right choice of words!"

"NO! IT wasn't! Gimp means I don't have ARMS. I have arms!"

"You're taking this..."

* * *

The two fought.

Perfect.

It was what Karma wanted.

"NO I'M NOT!" Terasaka balled a fist.

"You... I can't stand..."

* * *

All the yelling around him became just noise.

Once again everyone had their eyes fixated on something else. The yelling match.

Karma used the opportunity to put the joint of his index finger to his lip in thought, resting it there while he watched the back of her head disappear over the end of the path.

She showed up and went into shock the first time she seen Koro Sensei, an innocent response. Then days later, knocks Terasaka in good. Then apologizes, not entirely all in good faith, or so he thought.

He brushed back his red hair from his eyes.

 _Multi-dimensional._

He sat back down in his chair. His train of thought so strong it only let bits and pieces of the yelling float in.

* * *

"You.. I...!"

"Terasaka! You're such.."

"With that sm..."

"Go on... !"

* * *

Underneath the skin... there were reasons why even after the apology after she shouted and proclaimed so loudly to leave her alone.

Finding people out wasn't just fun for him, it was more less a game.

He was just... so good at it.

* * *

"You're an idiot!"

"Wha..!"

"Just bec..."

* * *

Karma began watching the two fight, thoughts still elsewhere.

 _I'll have you figured out in two weeks._

He yawned.

 _Just like all the rest._

* * *

"Big mou.."

"Jus zip.."

 _All the rest._

He smirked.

"SERIOUSLY!" Karasuma yelled suddenly coming inside. "ARE YOU TWO DONE ALREADY?!"

"YEH! We could hear you all the way down to the teacher's lounge!" Bitch Sensei piped, arms crossed.

"KARMA STARTED IT!" They both yelled in unison pointing at him.

Karasuma and Bitch glared.

"Whaa? Me?" Karma shied.

"YES YOU!" They both yelled in unison again.

 _Uh oh. Looks like a write up for me._


	7. Chapter 7

7

"Alright class." Koro Sensei flashed in and out at mach speed avoiding guns the class pulled to shoot him with.

Zumi quickly realized in that week, it wasn't bullets, but something else, small magenta BB's, and not just the knife handed to her in P.E., all the knives were rubber. So, the weapons they were using to quote un-quote 'kill' the yellow octopus weren't even real weapons!

She had overheard the wavy red-headed girl speaking with the blonde girl, that the 'weapons' would kill him though. Zumi thought it was peculiar.

Probably made of some sort of special material that perhaps worked on the super-creature, but not harmful to humans.

To her, it was like all her classmates then... were just 'playing' the role of assassins.

But she... she didn't come from a world of dollhouses and dream cars to put barbies in.

Zumi lived in the actual world.

The one with crime.

 _Idiots._

"I've decided to enlist the class in competitions this semester. Of course, summer break is over, but that doesn't mean that we can't still work on team building!"

 _What?!_

Zumi was already up to her ears in this class!

What did Koro Sensei have up his damned witch sleeves now?!

She heard some other's depressive sighs.

Good to know she wasn't the only one.

"Aside from competing in the Culinary Competition towards the end of the year, and the Acting Competition, the major ones on the campus..." He pulled out a huge book, and slammed it down on his desk at the front of the class.

The firing stopped. It was just Terasaka and Sugino who had guns up anyway.

Zumi had fully blended into the atmosphere of the classroom now, people would randomly shoot guns at the teacher throughout the day and the rest of the class just loomed on. She was in the middle of that looming, and had found it nice and quiet.

"WHAT?" Terasaka barked. "What'd you want us to do now?!"

Zumi rolled her eyes

 _God. He just never shuts up!_

"Nrujuhuhujuu!"

His laugh got under her skin.

"Every two weeks we're going to have an E Class competition. To keep up those competitive spirits!"

The whole room said nothing.

"While competing with the other classes at the main campus in the two other events we have this semester, I want to instill a sense of competition inside the E Class itself as well! Competitions paired with events that will bond you together more! I insist on total class participation!"

Zumi felt sick.

 _Barf._

She wanted to stick out her tongue, and fake choke just to make a disturbing point, but that red-head next to her, she knew would use it to attempt to bother her...

* * *

 _Tuesday After School_

He walked up as if he had no care in the world, ignoring all the threats.

"Hi." He snuck aside her.

"What do you want?" She huffed down the mountain path, carrying an extra book that had been tacked on by Koro Sensei to study language arts. She had to get to work! As if sitting by him wasn't enough!

 _God damn it!_

"Ohh nothing." He leisurely slid the words out, sticking his arms behind his head, walking carelessly.

He wore the same thing to school everyday too.

They all fluctuated their uniforms from time to time, and this guy, always always always... had the top two buttons unbuttoned on his crisp white shirt.

He was just straight up forcing himself in her presence.

 _How annoying!_

"You know what?"

"Hm?" He popped an eye open.

"You annoy the shit out of me." Zumi trudged ahead of him.

She probably shouldn't of said that...

* * *

Because the 'annoyance' pressed on through the week.

* * *

 _Wednesday Afternoon_

"Could you... just shut up?" Terasaka was not happy.

The faux salmon-head rolled in laughter.

Zumi looked pissed, and was pissed. She remained quiet, still not participating in outdoor activities to learn skills to 'kill' the professor.

"I see you got paired up with your girlfriend today!" Karma blurted.

Zumi's face got red.

She knew that quick-witted turd seen it, because the whole rest of the day he bugged her.

* * *

 _Wednesday After School_

"So you like Terasaka right?"

She grumbled.

Not only had this idiot proven himself to be the master poker of buttons, but also sort of a bully.

Zumi wasn't surprised, right from the start she had him pegged.

What she was surprised about was how careless he was about it.

 _He surely must enjoy it a hell of a lot, to keep this going so long._

"I don't like anyone. Go away."

He seemed kind of taken aback for a second by her harsh tone, but then settled right back into the smooth teasing. His brow physically settling almost into a sly smile all of it's own.

"Ahh... so rough."

She grimaced, _ick._

Those words came out almost too suavely. Who did he think he was? What did he think his bullying was getting at?

Again, she trudged ahead on the path, leaving the dip-shit snickering in his classy square-toed's.

* * *

 _Thursday Morning_

"OHAYO! Sunshine!"

 _JESUS!_

She had just got to the edge of the path to the mountain and he was already there!

"It's 7 am asshole. Better be important." She mumbled passing him by, and he turned behind her as she passed to follow.

"Oh not really." He chidded.

Zumi was beginning to realize he was just bugging the shit out of her on purpose!

Saying nothing of importance at all. Doing nothing of importance. Making zero points.

Just trying to crawl under her skin!

And for what?

He opened his mouth to say something but she cut him off...

"Could you just not?" She barked irritably.

She stopped at the delta at the bottom of the hill where two different trails split, so the students could take either left or right up the mountain, and she realized Nagisa was standing down there, and had just gotten off of his bus, and he was looking up at them from his vantage point below.

"HI NAGISAAAAA!" He bellowed extraordinarily loud.

She knew he just did it to bug her.

Nagisa waved back coyly.

"Uh...Hi... Karma." His voice barely audible from down the hill.

Zumi growled in frustration.

 _DAMN FOOL!_

She bustled off. The last thing she wanted was somehow people in class associating her with that Salmon!

* * *

 _Thursday After School_

She had made it through the rest of the day soundlessly and speechlessly.

Zumi had received a few odd glances from the class, just enough for her to capture in her mind that that little shit, Nagisa, spread it around that she was speaking with that dummy.

 _So, he's friends with a snitch._

She shouldn't of expected anything less of her peers, honestly, she knew how it was in school. Any news of anything 'juicy' made it around the whole school like flies to a hot-buttered pancakes.

And 3-E was very secluded, news that she was talking to anyone, since she was the new 'hot article' in class, was sure to make the headline.

She needed to scramble off to work anyway, then tomorrow a re-start.

Zumi had no faith in people.

Hopeless.

But at least the remaining threat from Monday was still enough to build upon a wall.

She seen a flash of red.

Instantly she grumbled.

If only she could get this idiot to go away!

By some supernatural force at the delta where the paths crossed, they met.

"So..." He yawned.

"So?" She mimicked but in a mocking tone. She sped up to get ahead, a childish attempt she knew, but she had to get to work!

He picked up his pace too, sucking soda out of a can.

"Ah, not one for words today? You see, I know you seem tough, but I can tell you're just a trapped kitten."

She grumbled. Running down the hill and hopping straight on the bus.

Again... that laughter.

* * *

 _Friday_

As Koro Sensei started heading down the rows to hand out the flyers, that contained all the titles and details about the bi-weekly E Class competitions and follow-up events, Zumi just stared out the window.

It had started to rain.

She turned her head from facing anyone.

More work was exactly what she didn't need.

That boy. Giving her glances, scheming up what to rile her up with next, she didn't need.

She chose to ignore all of it.

 _Karma. So that's your name._

 _How dumb._

And... he had no idea what her life had been like, all week he hadn't made any comments... until yesterday.

* * *

As sensei slowly passed out flyers, making sure to take time to speak with each student about their thoughts...

Karma took the time to glance at the back of her head.

Light brown hair, same as before, like he had watched trail up the stairs when she had beat the snot out of Terasaka.

 _Ignoring everything._

He wanted her to give him something.

Anything.

Really.

* * *

He had no idea what her life had been like.

How pissed she got when she had been compared to a 'kitten', being naive, acting young, had been out of her life, out of her personal motto for a long time.

She wished she could go back to being softer, wished she could somehow reverse and do-over simpler times, but that wasn't the case.

How it had actually kind of hurt her. That comment.

 _A trapped kitten._

His voice repeated in her head.

She wouldn't look at him. She wouldn't let him have pleasure in her frustration.

That was all in all what fueled him.

* * *

He had tried his normal go-to: Tip-toeing around the bush, being annoying on purpose.

Usually that was what would make some spill.

It was his quickest go to solution.

Most get too angry, so that eventually they'd just break, and he'd practically, after a sheer number of bothersome disturbances, little chats, have them begging him to leave them alone.

They'd give him whatever he wanted.

In this case?

 _Go away._

Her sentence on Wednesday.

It pissed him off.

The way she could just brush it off... him off.

* * *

She had kept her silence, other than busting out a few times to just tell him to shut up, be quiet, cuss at him a bit.

 _You won't find out shit._

He was fishing entirely in the wrong waters.

Salmon's name might be Karma, but she knew truly, as the fish that he was, he was beginning to swim too far upstream.

She shook her head in thought.

He would put himself in danger if he wasn't careful.

 _If he'd just leave me alone._

If he just wouldn't dig.

* * *

All he had gained from her was...

1.) that she was rough around the edges

2.) that she took the 56-F bus downtown most of the week.

3.) somehow she knew Isogai, at least enough that she speaks with him, that they 'understand' each other somehow.

4.) she knows martial arts.

5.) she keeps her private life... private.

He felt silly for resorting to writing bullet points on plain white paper and folding it inside of his English textbook.

Karma knew that this 'project' was going to last a little bit longer than he anticipated.

* * *

"Zumi-kun, here's a list for you." Koro Sensei said, placing it on her desk.

He had gone through the class slowly so he could gather information on the student's individual thoughts about the project line-up.

"What do you think?" He asked.

"Whatever."

Karma actually snickered because Koro Sensei started having a mini-freak out, turning green and flipping out over her response.

"But I've put so much work into this!"

She knew fully well, and already experienced a few of his tantrums, and outbursts.

The sensei's attitude, aside from being a monster, was so off.

It bugged her.

"I picked out so many special things, I've made so many calls! I've done so much to try to make this happen! Tireless hours! I was so exhausted! Without sweets, I also didn't make it!"

"FINE!" Zumi snapped, grabbing up the paper.

Karma, her neighbor, as she turned around, looked away.

Koro Sensei stopped fake crying and throwing himself on the floor like a whiny 2 year old.

"This one is cool."

Karma raised his eyebrow.

He couldn't see it. He couldn't face her either or she'd know he was spying at her this whole time.

Which one was it?

"Very good!" Koro Sensei instantly brightened.

"They're all artistic orientated."

Karma was intrigued, by Koro Sensei's request she actually said something worth some meaning, other than blandly, dryly responding to him to answer a math equation or something.

"What else?"

She looked back at the paper sighing.

"I do see... a lot of the events probably did take you quite some time to prepare."

"Ah! Yes! Any input?"

"Uh." She meekly said. She didn't want to contribute, but she did have a question. "You sure you have a venue for that?"

Koro Sensei began scratching his head, and the entire classroom saw.

Karma was still mildly displeased that he couldn't see which one in particular she engaged him on, which one she was pointing at.

The first actual conversation he'd heard her have...

And he couldn't entirely understand it.

He scanned his paper that sensei had already given him slowly, giving off no alarm that he was doing so because he wanted more insight.

 _It could be any of them._

"Ah yes! How thoughtful Zumi!" He exclaimed. "It's a surprise."

"Great." She responded lifelessly.

Back to the dry, plain emptiness that she always showed.

Apparently, that was good enough for Koro Sensei, as he turned around and whisked back up front.

"Class dismissed!"

She was one of the first ones out the door today.

Karma didn't even have time to throw on his jacket!

He wanted to enlist a little more precarious measures than before.

* * *

Koro Sensei saw him whip out the door too.

A little quicker than normal.

 _Ahh... Narujuhgugh._

* * *

"Hey there."

Zumi rolled her eyes and just kept walked.

One afternoon of peace this week.

 _One._

That's all she was asking for.

"What do you want?" She sounded put-off, and she really was. She had to go to work again, and she was going Blue, Boss Man needed her badly there instead of dish washing, and she didn't have time for this dude.

She had yet to get changed into her uniform of the night!

And it was sprinkling. No umbrella meant wet hair, sloppy shoes, and mud. She would have to clean herself up.

"Getting on then bus today?"

She turned her head at that. Watching him looking everywhere except at her.

Did he actually just ask her a question? A logical one?

This... Karma.

Will always be a fish. A smelly fish.

 _He'll be dead fish if he keeps it up._

"None of your damn business." She realized that he had seen her boarding the bus, the only answer.

"Ahh? Just asking."

Casanova-ish. Smarmy and gross. Were her thoughts.

Her perversion towards someone her age, towards him, unparalleled, except by only one other in her life.

And... no one could ever match that person. Yet another that she wished would just... melt away, like hot caramel on a sundae.

To the bottom of the dish.

"What's your deal?"

She actually worked up the gumption to ask!

That surprised him.

Nagisa was again at the bottom of the hill, getting ready to board a bus.

He seen, looking surprised that she, the dreaded nose-breaker, was even entertaining conversation with another human being.

 _Shit!_

The wall she wanted to build!

She knew full-well this was the 2nd time that Nagisa caught her and Salmon talking!

 _No!_

Her brain exploded.

 _It's not talking!_

She went through a convincing internally. Her head overloading with anger. Wanting to run over there and shake that blue-haired nut into a frenzy, to scream to him, 'He's just annoying the shit out of me! We aren't talking! That's all! I just hate him! And he drives me nuts!'.

She gritted her teeth as she her thoughts had her locked in a death stare with Nagisa... who looked... confused.

Her path partner noticed.

"Don't worry about Nagisa... I won't tell him anything." He smiled slyly.

She snapped.

"What the hell are you even talking about? There's nothing going on! And there never will be! So just walk the fuck out of my life..." She balled a fist at him. "And we won't have a problem Salmon!"

Suddenly a look crossed his face that stopped her ranting.

 _Had?_

Zumi's eyes instantly widened.

She meeped her mouth closed.

* * *

 _Aww!_

Karma was pleased.

She'd given him a title.

Albeit an unflattering one.

By revealing to her just a tad of information, per sey, some information that he 'might of' seen her transportation...

Then using Nagisa to his advantage... classic bait and switch.

He riled her up, baited, then switched to the dreaded acknowledgement of being shown to of been 'talking' with him... again.

 _Oh! How embarrassing for you._

* * *

It wasn't embarrassment for her.

It down-right made her mad.

She was supposed to build a wall! A strong, fortified one that would ensure that nobody from the class could take a look inside, could pitch a look at her dreaded life. Spray-painted on the wall would be 'keep out!' in large letters.

* * *

He smiled almost heavenly at this, at his thoughts, the scene.

It was all too perfect.

His eyes began to narrow the way a wolf looks at prey.

* * *

She got on guard. Throwing down her backpack. Unsure what was to happen.

Zumi knew she couldn't ready stance herself with a heavy ass pack. She had to get rid of it.

* * *

Unexpectedly, he stepped in close. But not that close.

He had wanted the ball in his court, and on accident she had given it to him.

He whispered from about the length away that they sat next to each other in class. "My name... is Karma."

* * *

That was enough!

She ripped her pack up off the ground and took off.

He just watched her back, brown hair floating in the breeze, fluttering down the road like a flustered little bug.

So... she wasn't taking the bus today.

Nagisa obviously seen him staring at her.

He had picked up on it.

Karma walked over.

"What are you planning Karma?" He just couldn't keep it to himself.

"Ohhh? Nothing."

Nagisa didn't take that as an answer as he stepped on the bus.

"You missed your bus." Karma pointed out.

Nagisa shook his head. "Watching you."

Karma shot him a glance as the door closed and their eyes narrowed at each other, for different reasons.

The one left standing at the bus stop just smiled.

He wondered what he'd find out tomorrow.


	8. Chapter 8

8

Hearing keys turning in the lock, her head snapped towards the door.

"Mom?" Zumi replied, snacking on a bag of chips. She froze.

Instantly on high alert.

"Yeh, whew." Closing the door behind her.

Ms. Yakujushi's uniform from the factory was in disarray. She turned to latch the 5 locks on the door, and then snapped the foot bolt.

Alert gone.

Zumi instantly dropped the whole bag of chips onto the island in the run-down kitchen, and sprinted over to her, enveloping her in the warmest hug.

"Oh Zumi! You have no idea how much I've missed this!" She held her so incredibly tight. "I'm home tonight because they actually ran out of jobs for me to do."

She was crying into her mother's sweat-laced uniform, her black pants needed a stitching, the hem was coming undone.

"Mom!" She wailed into her chest. "I... I haven't seen you in almost a month!"

"Shh, I know hunny. I know." Her over-worked hands stroked her hair. Kissing the top of her head. "It's okay. I know."

"This opposite shift stuff..." She sniffled. "It sucks."

"I know it does. You're letters always get me through."

Zumi looked up at her as her mom wiped a tear out from under her eye, and across her high-cheek bones.

"I hope so." Zumi weakly mulled at her. "I write you one every morning before I leave for school at 6:15, because I know that you get back at 8, and you'll read it."

"That's right. Every time. I go to work at 10 pm, and when I get off at 7, then take the bus... as soon as I walk in at about 8, I swear I read it as soon as I get back." She kissed Zumi on the head again, her mother, taller than her, not by a lot, but enough, just enough to give her kisses still, the way she's always done.

Soon she knew, Zumi would out grow her.

"What are you still doing up anyway?"

"Oh, nah." Zumi let-go from the hug, going back to the kitchen. "I just woke up earlier than normal."

Her mom, sat her purse down on the floor and came into the kitchen getting a bottle of water out of the large plastic bag full of them on the counter. "Any food around here?"

Zumi smirked.

 _Oh mom._

Overnights never left her time to shop for groceries in stores, they didn't have much money, so they couldn't purchase much anyway, except to buy water, because drinking from the tap was a bad idea on the poor side, but somehow chips, and snack food still on occasion made it in the house.

Of course, whatever Zumi got handed at work, Boss Man let her have in styro-foam container.

Every night, she brought home whatever meals she could from work, so her mom could actually have something.

She'd eat half and then she'd leave half, and sometimes snag a few extra things and throw it in the sack.

Zumi started smiling widely.

"Today, I got a sandwich from the restaurant."

"Oh yeh?" Her mom took her jacket off. "God it's getting cold out there."

Zumi crunched in the side of her mouth.

 _I wish I could get you a new jacket right now._

She'd secretly been saving all month.

Her mom began to strip down and put on her pj pants in the corner of the room that had been tossed over a chair. All the curtains were drawn, it was finally light outside, but it was concealed.

Her and her mom changed in front of each other all the time. If only they had time together, but not.

No need for formalities. They were both working women.

"How American of your boss." She stated, stretching her back. "Uh... my back is killing me." She sat on the counter, swinging her legs.

Zumi smirked.

 _'Teraska has been complaining about his back.'_ Isogai had said. She could hear that sweet, kind voice of the boy in her head.

"Here's your sandwich and chips." She scooted it to the left.

"Ah, thanks for putting it on a plate for me. Those potatoes and beef he let you have last night, that was really good."

Her mom acted so much younger than what she actually was. She had had Zumi when she was quite young... an accident. At 14.

To Zumi, she had seen her struggle through so much, and they had struggled so much together, that her mom was more than her mom, only 14 years older, she was like her older sister. Her best friend.

She had told Zumi that she was an accident, but Zumi was made to understand by her mom, that that concept she had held at Zumi's birth, quickly fizzled.

Zumi held respect for her mom. For the fact that she came through and told her the truth.

Looked up to her for working so hard. They were equals.

Even just as a teenager, Ms. Yakujushi looked up to her daughter, and at an early age, allowed her to make the big choices in life.

Most of the time they seen eye to eye, so much, that in a way, they easily could be mistaken for sisters. They even acted similarly. Zumi was rougher around the edges than her mom, but Zumi and her mom, when together were practically inseparable.

Ms. Yakujushi opened her mouth to munch down on the end of rye bread of the hoagie, and through chews she spoke, crumbs getting everywhere.

It was making Zumi not snicker... giggle.

Giggle like... an actual girl.

"So what's this E Class like? I capture from your notes to me that it sucks."

"Ha, well. It does in some ways."

"Most ways it seems."

She hopped up on the counter with her mom.

"Yeh. Most ways."

Both their legs were swinging off the counter.

Zumi hadn't been this happy in awhile.

"Who's that block head your talking about?"

"Oh. That's Terasaka. I might of broke his nose."

She took a bite of a sandwich again, chewing, her brown eyes searching Zumi's face.

"Oh no no! It's not that bad." She waved her hands in a way that portrayed innocence, even though, she wasn't exactly... innocent. "It happened in P.E."

"Oh? It's not something I'd have to show up to school for is it?"

She knew what she was getting at. Her mom was wondering if it would take away a day from her at work.

They simply couldn't afford it.

"No. It was an accident." She felt guilty. Deeply guilty. She knew her mom knew she practiced martial arts upstairs in her room, and used the open room upstairs for it too, so she very well knew that Zumi could hurt someone if she tried.

But... it wasn't an accident, it had been on purpose. What she valued more was her mom knowing that it wouldn't cost them money loss.

"Okay... if you say so." Ms. Yakujushi said. She knew something probably happened, but she knew Zumi could handle it on her own. She could tell when Zumi was lying anyway, all in all she was her mother. The only reason she'd lie to her was because it was not to cause her worry, and also, Zumi would never lie about anything too too serious. She trusted her in that.

Breaking a person's nose was serious, but... if Zumi had it covered. Zumi had it covered.

"Yeh, Terasaka is the loud, dumb oaf-y type."

Her mom laughed, her light brown hair, similar to her daughter's, got smashed behind her ear.

"Ohhh... one of those. Is he cute though?"

"Uhh. I don't know."

She laughed again. "I take that as a no!"

"He's got this wacky looking dye job on his hair."

She coughed, taking a swig of water from the bottle. "That bad?"

"You. Have. No. Idea."

"Mmm, anyone else that's interesting?"

Zumi's mind floated around, trying to avoid thinking of a certain dumb, yellow-y eyed trouble maker.

"There's this other guy." Her mouth just kind of blurted, before she could even stop it. Her eyes sort of popped open in response like they were going to fall out of her head.

"Yeh... ?" Her mom poked her in the sides.

Zumi giggled.

"And what's this one like?"

"Well, I've been keeping track of him the most in my journals."

"Oh." Zumi's mom's tone instantly got flat. "Trouble?"

"I don't know yet."

"I hope not. We don't need trouble."

Zumi grabbed her journal from the counter. She actually had had it out and was reading through it before she left for school. She opened a page where Karma's dumb mouth showed that smirk. She had drawn a few other sketches of him so far, one of him in particular was the best representation of him, where she'd seen him standing against a wall outside, and to her, it kind of reminded her of a model photo, so she drew it.

Even though the guy's personality and wits drove her insane, he still did have a nice face.

"Does he have red hair?"

"Yeh. Kind of. It's dyed a weird salmon-y red color. Really saturated too."

"I don't think I've ever seen that... at least not on a boy."

"Me neither."

She showed her mom the other sketch. The one of him leaning against a wall.

"Mmm nice." That was her only comment, she was kind of taken by her growling stomach right now. Chomping down on the sandwich.

"He sits by me in class. Assigned seating, as always. On my right. And whenever we are in groups doing things, or outside, he always stalks around to the back, and I always catch him out leaning against the wall when everyone's doing other stuff."

"So in a way, he's kind of a black sheep?"

 _Well put._

"Yeh, I guess that's a good explanation."

"Well, watch out for that one."

"I have been."

She'd been watching, but somehow. He still gets in...

 _Under my skin._


	9. Chapter 9

(Author's Note: I realize that I have messed up the timeline. I wanted Zumi to enter E Class after Summer Break, about 2.5 - 3 months after the 2nd semester already started. In the series, after Summer Break, there remained only 1 semester until Koro Sensei was to blow up the Earth, however in my AU here, Zumi has stated within the 1st few chapters, that within 9 months, Koro Sensei would end the Earth. One semester of school is much less than 9 months. So, just bear with me... I'm pushing the date that Koro Sensei plans to destroy the Earth back on purpose. (It wouldn't be until June.) I have reasons for this. (So that there is time for these once every 2 week E Class competitions to play their roles in the story, amongst other things)... and this is also an Altered Universe story so... just read and imagine, and have fun.)

9

"Dad. I'm leaving." He didn't know why he even cared letting him know anymore.

No response.

He knew full well, he was asleep with his girlfriend in the other room anyway.

The one that he let move in with them.

The other 'girlfriends' he had to stop seeing because of it.

Karma stood there at the door, not allowing himself to look inside.

Not out of a fear of what he might 'see', because he already knew what his dad and his girlfriend had been doing in that room last night, but more so because he was just giving up.

His dad.

If you'd call him that.

Never did he mention anything about his home life to anyone.

The E Class knew he caused issues, obviously, he was in E Class, he was violent and uncaring, unafraid of conflict, and more than a tad manipulative, but he'd never shared what was going on in his home, he wasn't entirely secure in the idea of being friends with anyone too closely in the class enough for that, except Nagisa, sort of.

They had a history, not a long one, but one. They'd been friends, known each other before E Class.

But not even Nagisa knew...

Knew that his dad was slowly falling away... into a realm that Karma was growing to utterly dislike, possibly even hate.

It was bad when his mom left.

It was bad when his dad was sleeping around.

It was bad when his dad met his new girlfriend.

And... it continues to be bad.

At first, Karma had grown used to the 'badness' of it all, his home life was off the wire, not stable, but he had at least gotten used to it.

It was the devil he knew.

But his dad... letting someone move in?

This familiar dislike. It was growing to hate.

Karma didn't mind hate. Didn't mind it at all. He attributed hate as a natural human feeling, but in accordance with a parent?

Never had he thought that he'd entertain it.

Even after the infidelity of his father.

He disliked him then, disliked the empty environment, disliked the void that was left after his mom left, the void of her sadness when Karma told her instead, he wished to stay in Japan, to continue in school there.

But hate?

It's creeping in.

In the form of black hair, black eyes, and a pale form.

The woman, his dad chose to be with. 100% Japanese (not that that was the problem), the problem was just her.

Karma knew...

It was because of this that his dad... dad. He was changing.

Karma turned his back from the door, lifting himself away from the darker area of the house, and turning to the morning rays of light coming from the living room window.

His home. The house he had lived his whole life. Was it that still?

Time to go to school.

 _Time to escape this mess for awhile._

* * *

She dug around in her backpack. Cleaning it out before she took off, it had quite an accumulation of papers, old notes, and there was a broken mechanical pencil in the bottom of it.

Zumi took out the important things, the books, syllabuses, spiral notebooks, folders, and that dumb paper that Koro Sensei had handed out.

The octopus.

She had yet to openly call it sensei. Or him. Call him that. By now she had realized it was a 'he', and that he was male. She recognized him as a killer, a threat to her life, still more so than the educator.

 _The 'Koro Sensei'._

She examined the paper.

She smirked as she heard her mom singing in the shower upstairs, fed and happy.

Happy that she had gotten to see her daughter.

Singing.

They were so similar.

Except her mom had a horrible voice.

But every time her voice cracked, even though it was awful, it was distinctly 'her voice', and Zumi would never ever wish that voice, maybe not as beautiful to others as it was to her, to stop singing.

"Alright, let's see what you have planned." She spoke to herself, throwing away the garbage in the small plastic trash bag in the kitchen.

It was planned up all through summer... up til June.

The octopus had it's hopes high, that it wouldn't be killed by that time.

She shivered. She knew what that meant.

A possible end.

To everything.

Still, she'd leave it to the others. This was not her forte, it was not her wish.

She would not have blood on her hands.

"November 10th. November 24th. December 8th. December 22nd. January 5th. January 19th. February 2nd. February 16th. March 2nd. March 16th. March 30th. April 13th. April 27th. May 11th. May 25th. June 8th." She sighed. "Oh... my... god..."

It was... so much.

She had taken a glance over it, only to end the rant that the yellow freak was having, because it bugged the shit out of her, just as much, if not more so than that salmon-head did, but she hadn't taken the time to 'fully' inspect it all.

"On top of tests, homework, school-wide testing, and 2 school competitions, he expects us to do all of this shit?" Zumi was so frustrated. She mumbled. "At least I don't have to try to be killing him also."

That was the only bright side.

"Guidelines and instructions for each 2 week competition will be passed out after the completion of the previous. Winner of competition gets to pick 'the choice' on The Event, and wins immunity from the next 2 week competition, but will be put back into the pot for the next one after." She sighed again, sarcastic. "Fantastic."

She turned the paper to the back, where everything was listed.

"So... I won't know what I'm being made to do entirely until I get that paper every 2 weeks?" She irritably grumbled. "Not only does that _idiot_ push it, but so does my _teacher_. This goes all the way up through graduation!"

 _June 8th... The day of graduation._

Zumi began to read silently in her head.

 _November 10th. Competition: Literature / Event: 'Best-Seller's of All Time' Costume Dinner_

 _The Winner's Choices:_

 _1.) The Branchville Manor, Berkshire, England. A traditional English meal, in period costume, similar to Jane Austen's Pride & Prejudice. _

_2.) The Black Flute, New York, New York. A historic 1920's American meal, in period costume similar to F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby._

 _3.) Italiano Teatre, Medina, Rome. A renaissance meal, in period costume similar to Dante's Divine Comedy._

"Hmm, all out of Japan." She wondered how in the world the octopus was going to get them all to the location. She betted it would be expensive travel-wise, where would he come up with the money? Had he come up with the money already?

They'd be getting the competition rules and instructions today. It was 2 weeks before November 10th.

Today was October 27th, Friday.

"Four more days and it's Halloween in the US." She found herself muttering as she started shoving the paper back in her bag.

 _And then work on the weekend at Blue Mark._

She scrambled to stuff her books back in, the backpack was emptied out of trash finally.

Except for one piece of paper.

It was crumbled up.

"Damn missed one."

Zumi pinched it out of the bottom. It had gotten a bit bruised up from having heavy materials smashing it down, for weeks, probably months.

The paper made her question.

It wasn't her paper.

It was from a spiral notebook, but one with black lines, not light blue ones.

Her gray eyes in curiosity, un-crumbled the ugly wad of paper, which at one point, seemed like it had been kind of folded.

 _Oh._

Upon flattening it out, un-rumpling it, she knew.

 _Salmon._

It was that damn wadded up piece of paper he threw at her. It had touched her drawing hand. When he had caught her staring at the others. Sizing them up. The same way in which she sized him up, and then realized he was just a boy, and grew tired of it and looked away...

But not without realizing first... that he was in shape, a nice-dresser, and kind of a slacker.

However, they'd already had one test since she'd been there, and perhaps he wasn't as dumb as what she thought. He got a 100%, she knew only because their scores had been announced.

How it had pissed her off! She had only got an 80!

That day was another day she turned to face the window most of the day instead of facing that bully's smirk.

He probably would of used it as fuel against her, had he known it'd made her mad. If... she gave him the time of day... which she doesn't. Which she won't.

Zumi noticed a swell within her growing, her fury towards him, how it made her think of him so.

Everything that infuriated her, she grew to understand that she had to hide it from the turd.

He already knew it made her mad when he used Terasaka in a way... referring to him as her 'boyfriend'.

Of course, it was all mockery, to get a rise out of her, and she knew it...

But that was enough.

All week she'd been nothing but cold to him, if not colder than before.

She'd let slip her little dumb nickname she called him.

That... he hadn't brought back up though.

He still only continued to rile up Terasaka, and secretly rile her up by using the oaf.

Zumi sighed and looked at the words on the crinkled paper.

Somehow, it must of gotten swept up into her bag that day.

As she began to read...

Her eyes began widening.

She figured it'd be some stupid gibberish like "What are you drawing?" or "Hello new girl, so you like to draw? That seems cool." or "I see you got frightened by Koro Sensei!" blah blah blah... barf puke.

Because at first, he seemed kind of 'nice', that of course, that was just a quick thought, and that was before he started forcing himself around her, bullying, and being pushy, if not mildly stalk-ish, asking her if she was taking the bus.

Before he was being a dumb-ass and making fake 'insinuating' scenes out in front of Nagisa down by the bus stop.

But this, she hadn't expected.

Clearly, it confused her, because it didn't make sense.

 _The sense of the world is short,_  
 _Long and various the report,_  
 _To love and be beloved;_  
 _Men and gods have not outlearned it,_  
 _And how oft soe'er they've turned it,_  
 _'Tis not to be improved._

 _\- Ralph Waldo Emerson_

What was the meaning of that?

Why had Salmon wrote that?

Zumi shook her head.

It was a beautifully formatted poem, and she knew who Ralph Emerson was, what was surprising... is that for such a dick-hole, he had poetry memorized.

That day, during that time, they had been in math... Literature was over for the day, and he had nothing except for that black-lined notebook out.

At least, from what she recalled. Recollected.

Why would he write something so eloquent, then treat her so unjust, uncouth?

She sighed again, the whole morning had been full of nothing but sighs so far.

His handwriting, it was plain, just like she remembered from their short notebook conversation, cut even shorter by her.

Unmistakably, it was penned by that fish.

That day she had also followed up by her slamming her hand down on his desk with the bat portrait.

It had been an attempt to convince him to stay back, which obviously hadn't worked.

Rolling her eyes, she stuffed the poetry inside of her journal left on the counter in the kitchen.

She had no idea in hell why.

 _It's because I like Emerson._

She found her internal resolve convincing enough.

Time to head to school.

"Bye mom!" She had heard the shower shut off.

A muffled 'Bye! I love you!' came from upstairs.

Zumi heard it just before she shut the door, locking it.

She waited outside.

In two minutes she heard the other latches lock from inside. Foot bolt snap.

 _Good._

She seen the blind pull down just a bit, and saw three fingers wiggle.

Zumi smirked.

Mom.

 _The best mom. My mom._


	10. Chapter 10

10

She sat outside under a shade tree, far off to the side of the track area.

It was a silent protest, so far so good.

The bark of the tree was a bit sharp against her back, but it wasn't bad.

Karasuma, unsuccessful.

She knew he was mad. Did she care?

Not one bit.

When push came to shove, if someone didn't want to do something, you really couldn't make them.

Karasuma had been trying for 3 weeks to get Zumi to participate in the activities involved in Physical Education. And for 3 weeks she ignored every attempt. Simply sitting down on the ground Indian-style and not moving, that was a good move. Also, another fantastic move was just simply walking away, disappearing until it was over. Another excellent one was participating by only holding towels, or baskets of water for the lame 'assassins', that one was more of a stale mate, as she was still considered 'helping', but still not participating.

Every few days she'd come up with a new way to evade Karasuma.

Today it was placing her butt under a tree, far enough off that she could disappear from view at least. Maybe he'd then forget she was there.

Exactly what she wanted.

* * *

"Look at her sitting over there..." Terasaka mumbled. "It's unfair."

He unfortunately was paired with Karma.

Karma stopped high-kicking into the pads that 'Saka held.

That had worked him into a sweat, kicking was one thing he needed to practice, especially his high-kicks, and his low-blocks.

Terasaka stood up, letting the pads that were thick and strapped to his arms fall to his sides, then he used one to look up at the sun, using the pad to shade his eyes.

"Hot as hell out here too, strange for the season."

Karma didn't say anything.

He was certain that he probably would, but he hadn't.

"What's your deal? Do you think this is unfair? Or what?"

Karma was wiping his sweaty forehead in his shirt, it was uncommon of him.

Really it was to hide his face.

As a matter of fact, he did think it was unfair.

And it pissed him off to no end.

* * *

Under the tree, it was comfortable.

* * *

"Her eyes are closed." Terasaka shook his head. "Taking a nap."

Karma finally chimed in. "If you're so interested in what Miss Ice Queen over there is doing, why don't you go join her?"

Terasaka just shot air out of his nose in a huff. "I'm tired of the jokes."

Karma rolled his eyes at him, still wiping his forehead.

"You make so many..." Terasaka smirked in a sadistic way that caused Karma to quirk and eyebrow in the direct sunlight while evading Sugino who'd gotten a bit to close.

"Uh. Sorry there."

Karma waved him off, and Sugino and his partner backed back to their area, they had just gotten a bit off track with the kicking routine, and hadn't been paying attention to how much ground backwards they were going. Simple mistake.

"I'm starting to think maybe you like her." Terasaka finished.

Karma snapped his head in the brute's direction.

"What?" Obviously irritated, he masked it by making it sound flat. The delivery as bland as possible.

"You heard me." Terasaka crossed his arms with the padding, setting it back up for Karma to start kicking again, he got low and Karma began to kick.

* * *

She hazily looked out across the field, her eyes heavy, she felt like she was passing out, but she didn't quite want to.

* * *

CRA!

The sound of a kick on a pad.

Karma set up for another. This time left.

CRA!

"No." Karma stated.

CRA!

"Yeh. Okay." Terasaka mocked from behind padding.

The heat was intense, the last day of heat that year, probably.

CRA!

"Then why?"

Karma grunted swinging another leg.

CRA!

"Why what?"

He played dumb. Terasaka was an idiot, just leave it at that.

His army boot connected with the pad.

CRA!

"Why are you still doin' it?"

A high right kick.

CRA!

No response.

CRA!

CRA!

CRA!

They stood up and moved back, just as Sugino and his partner had to get back to their original ground.

Terasaka got down again. Making sure that nobody could hear what he was saying to Karma.

For some reason, he felt he was in the right not to speak to loudly.

CRA!

It hadn't occurred to Karma.

That if he kept doing it... what it'd look like.

CRA!

"To bother you."

CRA!

"Right." Terasaka sighed off, as another kick connected to the pad, that time pushing him off balance a little.

CRA!

"Uhff." He fell back a bit, but then regained his posture, waiting for Karma to kick again.

Karma wiped his forehead on his shirt.

* * *

She watched the poet with a shaded look.

He wasn't bad at the high kicks.

Easy to find across the field with that saturated head of hair.

* * *

CRA!

"I don't believe you."

CRA!

Karma grunted.

 _No way._

Terasaka had picked up on his mild interest in the girl.

Karma was surprised, for as shallow of a common sense reader as Terasaka was, he had indeed picked it up.

He had to set him straight.

CRA!

"It's not that."

"Then?" Terasaka pushed a tad. He didn't want to piss Karma off of all people, but he couldn't contain it.

CRA!

Karma released that kick with an ARRA sound. Obviously it took a bit of stamina out of him.

Without thinking, that kick, made his mouth bubble out some words that didn't come out the way that he wanted them to.

"She's difficult."

Terasaka looked dumbfounded. Maybe it hadn't been what he thought.

CRA!

That kick was harder than his last.

ARRA! Came out of his mouth again.

Terasaka noted a slight irritation.

Karma bent down to catch a breath, actually for-real catching a breath this time. His kicks, they needed work.

"I can relate." He pointed to his face. His nose in particular.

The bent over one just nodded, he got it.

Karma stood now, adjusting his eyes to look over at her resting, a small ball-sized form sitting under a far off tree.

* * *

He had taken a break.

She closed her eyes quick.

 _He needs to turn his legs inward more._

* * *

Karma was perplexed.

Terasaka watched him glance over there.

"So... You do?"

"No." Karma responded.

'Saka lowered to a whisper. "Karma."

The red head turned to him instead.

Their faces met, glaring, Terasaka's brutish, square-jawed one, against Karma's smooth, more boyish one. Searching for different things within each other faces. Neither willing to give in to the other.

"If the teasing is bothering to you, I'll stop."

His chin jerked to the side. It wasn't an apology, but it was a 'Karma-pology'. Something he had coined with his 'boyz'.

Karma never apologized for the things he did wrong, or that he thought he did wrong. But he did know the difference between right and wrong, even if he pushed it.

A Karma-pology was when he would tell someone what he was doing wrong, and then tell them a resolve.

It was never an 'I'm sorry', but it was close enough. At least for 'Saka it was.

He wouldn't push Karma for an apology, but he knew Karma meant sorry by saying it that way.

"Yeh, I'd appreciate it."

Karma just nodded.

"Because then... I could actually ask her out, and not be getting teased about it." Terasaka began to chuckle.

Karma turned his back to him.

 _So that's what this was about._

His face wore an unreadable expression.

She appeared to be napping under the tree.

She had no idea.

...Why'd he 'feel'?

"Well thanks for the chat!" A large hand slammed down on his shoulder, breaking him from whatever he was floating in briefly.

Again, he just nodded.


	11. Chapter 11

11

Karma sat in the middle of them in class.

Terasaka sat on his right. Zumi on his left.

All afternoon, after heading in from P.E., showering, putting back on his regular school uniform, making sure his top two buttons were un-done as usual, he just hated the way a tight collar felt, he was silent.

He hadn't taken a hot shower like the others.

He sat not looking at either one of them, just straight forward, slouching in his desk like he normally did.

Forcibly not staring at anything except either his books, pencil working lead into writing, or Koro Sensei.

Karma felt like this little 'secret' he had been let in on, he was in the middle of it, and what made it worse was that he literally WAS in the middle of it.

His desk separated them in class.

No doubt that if Terasaka had his seat instead of him, that he would of been the one that would of spoken to her first.

 _Tried to speak to her._

He had to correct himself.

Their meetings, the ones he forced on her, they weren't really conversations.

He hadn't really... learned anything.

She'd been incredibly cold, probably because of that little slip up she had had.

 _Salmon._

That nickname had came out with such frustration.

He got that he was being frustrating, that was exactly what he wanted. To pull info out... his un-working methods.

Then this past week, he'd just been spouting Terasaka & Zumi comments, trying to get deeper underneath. But instead of cracking more, like an eggshell, she instead clammed up.

His previous statement in his mind, of her...

 _picking and choosing her battles._

Remained.

When met with upfront confrontation... without a choice, she met it.

But how was she meeting the confrontation of him throwing a mocking Terasaka/Zumi 'sitting in a tree'?

It dawned on him.

 _I have been giving her choices._

It was mockery, it was an attempt to try to get under her skin, more abrasive than just following her down the path on the mountain/meeting up with her when she didn't want it, but still he offered her a way out.

Even when she had let that unflattering name fly.

He didn't make a move to really 'pin her down'.

 _Picking and choosing her battles._

He had already realized that she pegged him as not worth her time, and that only made him want to push harder, and he had, but in response she chose to evade him even more.

She'd been silent all week. Cold. Colder than normal. Not even really gracing him with a 'fuck off, go away, shove off.'

It occurred to him, he hadn't heard her voice in nearly 6 days.

He thought it was kind of funny the way she lashed out.

It reminded him so much of Bitch Sensei, like a younger, brunette, more Japanese version.

But now this.

Terasaka.

He liked her?

It was most confusing.

Karma was... not understanding.

He had been using that fake relationship. But it was exactly what it was... fake.

He didn't expect those words to fall out of the lunk's mouth.

Did Terasaka have a thing about tough girls?

Did it matter?

Karma sat, Koro Sensei's voice wavering out of his mind, creating a melancholy of enough atmosphere for him to mentally explore himself.

 _Does it matter?_

He asked himself internally.

She was his project.

Nobody told him what to do.

But Terasaka wasn't telling him what to do.

That information. It had caused his mind in that moment, to just STOP.

It was threatening. The words Terasaka said.

Because that meant, that for the mean time, his charade, it'd have to stop.

Out of respect for Terasaka's feelings.

He wouldn't try to step in front of a classmate's attempt at happiness, if that really was what Terasaka was after.

For some reason though, Karma felt that he knew better.

He knew her better.

He had been the one that watched her watch them.

He did.

Karma did.

 _I did._

He seen that she had no interest in the guys.

Except Isogai, which he hadn't entirely worked into an equation for him to use as of yet.

But, with this recent information, he might not even get to that.

For now, Karma felt like he had had the door closed on him.

And it was infuriating.

What was just as bad as someone telling him what to do, was someone blocking his fun.

But what was worse was another guy getting in another's guys way when it came to a girl.

He had to follow the 'bro code'.

He didn't want Terasaka unhappy, at the root of it.

And he knew, that if Terasaka said it, the tall dummy was too upfront to be much of a liar, then it must be the truth.

His truth was that he really did... somehow... like her.

Even after she had broke his nose.

It was down right laughable!

But Karma wasn't laughing.

He wasn't doing anything.

He noted:

He was just... put-off.

 _Put-off as hell._

But he'd stay out of it.

Right now, facing forward was what was best.

He honestly, did find his eyes, without reason, trying to make their way to her side of the classroom.

Kind of habitually.

He'd need to cut that out.

He didn't want to create heat with Terasaka.

If he caught him staring at her, after telling him, what he told him... he wasn't sure what Terasaka would do, but Karma was certain he knew at least, what Terasaka would think.

'Saka would think that he had lied to him, if he caught him looking at her.

The brute was... possessive. Just as much as he was.

 _Possession._

That word made him feel like some sort of warlock.

A spell caster.

The only spells he wanted to throw were ones where she'd leak info.

He knew then.

That was why.

 _Put off._

Somehow. His mind. He had been giving her so much of his time, to figure her out.

And had been finding out so little...

That Karma felt attached.

A line had been drawn somewhere.

One that involved a mild form of possession.

He was instantly almost... disappointed in himself.

Why had he not realized that?

Realized where his brain had been going.

 _Almost._

But it was only almost.

He was okay with feeling possessive, he knew, and had known for a long time, just as feelings of hate, that feeling a sense of possession towards something or someone was natural. An accurate, real feeling, that humans muster, that if fed enough... could grow.

 _Do I want to feed it?_

It was more so that he couldn't... right now.

His line was being cut with scissors.

By Terasaka.

The one thing, the only thing then, that he had a slight inkling towards was that...

She'd turn him away.

Selfishly, then he'd have the chance to either feed or not feed what he felt.

That small, tiny...

"KARMA!" Koro Sensei shouted loudly.

The salmon haired boy's eyes snapped up to him.

"What?!" Karma bellowed. Instantly annoyed.

"I asked, what is the answer to the social output study on page 24."

"Uh." It just came out of his mouth so ajar. That the class, some of them, turned to just look at him.

Karma always had the answer.

But not this time?

"Were you not paying attention?" Koro Sensei asked, his tentacles floating around with three books in them.

"Not really." He responded in a typical suave Karma voice, his go-to.

Koro Sensei blinked abruptly. "Karma-kun, you know how I punish those who don't pay attention right?"

Karma's eyes opened rapidly. He knew.

 _NO!_

He wasn't fast enough! He had tried to jolt from his desk.

In an instant, there was a flash of wind through out the room, and Koro Sensei at mach speed got done in half a second what would have taken a proper hairdresser an hour to accomplish.

That saturated red hair of his. Only a few strands remained on his desk.

"What'd you do?!" Karma stood up balling a fist at the yellow octopus who was up front again with scissors, hair spray and a dust pan of Karma's hair laughing.

"Nurururuju! I gave you a sleek new haircut! You needed one!"

Karma knew he had needed one! It just wasn't on his list of priorities! He also didn't have money. His dad wouldn't give him any.

In a second, the octopus was in his face again with a handheld mirror.

"Oh lookie you Karma! You look so nice!" Someone said, teasing.

The class snickered.

He grabbed the mirror, he had to see what the octopus had done.

He held it up to his face.

It actually... wasn't bad.

He had left it shaggy on the top, obviously he had re-layered it like it had been before, and left his front bangs which the sensei knew he liked. But the octopus had shaved the whole underneath very short.

It looked.

It looked.

"This isn't Attack on Titan!" He exclaimed.

"But it looks so good on you Karma-kun! Don't you agree class?!"

Everyone started laughing.

He turned the mirror to look at the sides that he been precisely feathered into the back.

Koro Sensei had done a fine job, even if he wasn't sold on the Levi look.

That was when he seen it.

Her eyes, those gray ones, staring at him, using the mirror to do it, to see the expression on his face obviously.

Smiling eyes. Ones filled with entertainment... in his misfortune.

How cold. How ugly was the feeling he knew was behind those overcast orbs.

He knew she was laughing at him internally.

She had finally seen... what really got under his collar: The ridiculous 'punishments' Koro Sensei did, and he only did it to him! Because he knew that Koro Sensei knew it embarassed the shit out of him.

He knew right now, his cheeks were a shade of light pink.

Koro Sensei's punishment for not paying attention.

 _That's right, get a kick out of this._

His eyes met hers, it was the only contact they'd held all week.

It made him...

It made him...

All of it... made him mad.

That's when he knew, with his face dawning an embarrassing shade of red... for a number of reasons, and her staring up at him with a silent, amused look.

His lids narrowed.

 _She was his to figure out._


	12. Chapter 12

12

"Okay class! The instructions for the literature competition! In 2 weeks... I expect excellence! Full class attendance! Everyone!" He handed out a yellow paper, loaded with words to each, and in a single-file line they all grabbed one, storming out the door, out of the E Class Building, and began walking down the mountain, some excitably running because it was Friday, the weekend now, and they had made plans.

Kaede was probably the most excited as she skipped out of the room like she was jumping rope.

Then finally, it was the last student. Last as always. Koro Sensei handed him the paper, but it didn't seem that he cared much.

He never cared much, at least, that's what it came off as, but that was not the case, because he got fantastic scores and grades.

However, today something was incorrect about him. The Sensei knew, something was off.

"Karma-kun." He stopped him with a tentacle, one of his smaller ones, before the teen could walk through the threshold.

"What?" He looked up at the smiley face, his newly manicured long bangs swishing across his brow.

The Sensei noted that his voice was so dry. Irritable too.

"I have a question. Nrughujujh." Koro Sensei chuckled, not a joyous one, but a more withholding one, a different tentacle was held up like a pointer finger.

Karma was certain what this was about.

"Hn." That arid throat barely cracked. He slid the paper into his black lined notebook. He couldn't scram because the professor was in his way, and he knew when the sensei wanted answers he usually got them.

"You weren't paying attention earlier? I wouldn't of had to mess with your hair." It came out in a teasing manner. "Even though... your ends were split." he laughed again. "Every time you don't give the work undivided attention... I will style your hair like a different popular anime... how about that? Now I wouldn't want you to not have any hair left Karma-kun." He teased. "You wouldn't want to be bald now would you? You have the best hair! I'm jealous!" A tentacle went up to rub his shiny ball-head.

Karma's hazel eyes filtered to the wall. "It's fine."

"..." Koro Sensei realized that wasn't really an accurate, direct response to what he said, and he actually... still wasn't paying attention.

Karma narrowed his lids, looking spacey. Thoughts elsewhere.

The professor poked his cheek with a quick yellow poke. "Hello? Earth to Karma-kun! You awake?"

"Uhf... stop. I hate that." He barely fought back, only smacking it away slightly.

"You're not as aggressive about my 'punishments' as you normally are."

Hppf. Karma spurted air out of his nose. Huffy. His eyes did that gesture where they happened to nonchalantly 'roll' to the left, to look in a certain direction.

It was out the window.

In a second, Koro Sensei appeared behind him, looking in the same area.

Karma didn't see him. Impossible at that speed.

The sensei watched him watching, seeing exactly where his attention was going... on something... someone.

His right ear fizzled with a chill. From behind, whispers. Low toned: "I see what you're looking at Karma."

Startled, he froze. Eyes popped.

 _So. Sensei._

"All I had to do was watch." His voice, it wasn't coming off as being within a tonal realm of mischievousness, nothing grotesque, or slick. It was more as-a-matter-of-fact. The sensei had already realized the 'someone'.

"Not sure what your talking about." He said quietly, plainly. A lame play to get the professor off of his back, his eyes, like buttercups, flowing back and forth across the path, watching her. She sat down her backpack, readjusting something within it.

The professor wasn't convinced. Actions and words are two different things.

"You do." He confirmed.

He said nothing, closing his eyes. He couldn't escape, this was the only person (if you'd call the sensei a person), that he couldn't evade, at Mach Speed it was impossible. This made his skin boil.

"What I don't know... is the intent."

Karma peeked again, trying to hide the fact that he had his eyes open. Childish of him really.

Koro Sensei knew.

She had grabbed a comb out. He watched her fervently brush her locks, pushing them behind an ear as she flopped the pack back up on a shoulder, and restarted walking away.

 _To who knows where._

"I know about the bullying."

That sent his cheeks hot.

He should of known... that he knew.

Sensei knows everything.

Karma was feeling insecure about this conversation.

A hundred things raced. What is it exactly that Koro Sensei wanted to hear? Should this continue?

 _Should I say?_

Could he trust the sensei? Could he? The words that would spill out, come out, would they give off meaning? Meaning at all? Too little of?

He knows, maybe something. Not everything...

 _Not anything?_

It was the bane of someone with an overactive mind.

"I can see your brain working Karma-kun." He poked the back of his head, in a soft way, to get his point across, then flashed to the side of him again, where he had been before, the tentacle blocking the doorway gone. "You can leave now."

The professor wouldn't permit anymore of Karma's actions like that towards her. However, at the same time, Koro Sensei knew Karma too well at this point. Nothing would stop Karma from doing 'Karma', and being Karma. But he still wanted to make sure that Karma 'knew' that he 'knew'.

Karma looked at the ball of yellow, into it's eyes. He seemed hazy to the professor. Instead skedaddling, Karma's mouth dropped, and a few words spilled.

A babble.

"I'm confused."

"I know." The response came quick. It earnestly surprised him, Karma's openness.

Karma looked at him starry eyed. Nail on head. Lately he'd been having such trouble. His voice box having a mind of it's own. Getting away from him... somehow?

"Isn't conflict what you like?"

"Yes." It spilled again, his voice trance-like. And what was being uttered from it... it was nothing but pure truths.

"So?"

"Not now."

"Hm?" Koro Sensei, was now the one not understanding. That he didn't get. "I don't follow."

Karma tilted his head, trying to shake himself from this state, as if... to just let the teacher know that he was okay.

It was an honest attempt at help, that Karma did know, and that he did respect him for.

"Karma? What's confusing?" He said down the hall as he watched the red-head whisk out, those small black eyes boring holes into the back of his head where he had previously poked him.

Karma should of expected that the sensei knew something was going on.

He was too smart. Intelligent.

But he wasn't ready to say anything.

There isn't anything to say.

 _Nothing Sensei._

 _Nothing._

* * *

 _Monday_

Terasaka had finally got the bandages off of his nose that past Friday. He was ready to have them off as they had started to itch.

That's why he had bustled out the door so quick, grabbing the yellow paper and running off with his squad.

Everyone was outside, they were all standing around, awaiting Koro Sensei. They were all directed to the shade tree under which Zumi had been sitting under avoiding P.E.

Koro Sensei was running a bit late today, and everyone knew why. He was packing things up inside, obviously to have some sort of grand educational experience on the grass. Most everybody assumed it was to talk to them about the competition before the end of the day.

* * *

"Hey, uh, it's hot out, can I sit here?" Terasaka mumbled.

Zumi thought that it was fine out, a good temperature... so that was an odd statement.

She wanted to be left alone, she was more interested in seeing who liked to hangout with who.

She was sitting on a big, thick, old low branch on the tree by herself, and on the other low branch on the other side, the wavy red headed girl, Kaede, and another girl with dark hair and the same color eyes as Isogai chatted.

They were giggling up a storm, and it was making Zumi feel grossed out. It was honestly... too much.

That was one group that liked to hang out together she realized.

Another group, was a girl who was really quiet with dark pig-tailed braids and the guy with glasses (which Zumi already realized was amazing at science), were hanging out on the left side of the shade tree, closer to the edge of where the branches cut out less light. They were half in and half out of the shade.

Normally the girl was so shy she wouldn't talk to anyone, but with this guy she could clearly see that they must have enough in common that she was absolutely rambunctious, and speaking loudly enough that Zumi could actually hear her pronouncing words, even though they were far enough away that she couldn't make the words out.

Terasaka's clan sat together, until he came over here. That was normal.

Salmon with Nagisa. Also normal.

Sugino and Isogai sat together, and were kind of talking... kind of not really. Not enough in common probably. Isogai had shot a few glances at her. Isogai and her exchanges a few glances at least everyday, and if they worked together then they'd chat... sort of.

She was making mental notes so she could write about this experience in her journal later. She had made a habit of trying to draw everyone she could in there, notating everything she did, step by step, day by day.

But now, Terasaka had walked over and bugged her. She wasn't too happy.

Zumi shrugged at him. Neither saying yes or no with her actions... but more of a 'whatever'.

* * *

Karma sat up in the grass, staring hard at the school building.

 _How long is that octopus gunna take?_

Nagisa laid down on the grass, folding his hands over his chest, staring up at the clouds. His eyes were on Karma though. "Karma."

"Hm?" He responded from his throat. He was trying hard not to look over there. He figured if maybe he looked at the school building, up the stairs, then maybe he could just catch a glance peripherally, and Terasaka's group wouldn't notice. Not that it mattered physically, he could take any of them on, any day, any time. He was more concerned about Terasaka seeing him watching.

His previous feeling on not standing in another guy's way to ask a girl out still stood.

But so did his damn interests. His fun.

As soon as Terasaka stood to make a motion over there, Karma felt his whole body go white hot.

In expectancy.

He kept telling himself in his head that it was because he knew, and that was the only reason.

But that wasn't the entire truth.

He hoped.

Hoped that Terasaka would fail.

 _Miserably._

So he could be selfish.

* * *

"So, okay." Terasaka laughed under his breath. He scratched the back of his head in a goofy way that made Zumi crunch her nose.

 _It was..._

She couldn't quite place it. The way he did it was so immature. Child-like. Innocent. But yet, something loomed about it in her head.

He had gained her full attention as he hopped up on the low branch and sat close enough to her but not that close.

* * *

Karma fizzled.

He seen. In the corner of his eye. The proximity of them.

 _Damn it._

Nagisa seen Karma grind his teeth in his mouth, suddenly his face looked tense and false. "Uh. Karma?"

Karma knew. He knew that Nagisa noticed. "What." It came out as more of a statement than as a question as he just stared at the school building, his eyes protruding into the windows watching Koro Sensei grabbing stuff, some of it at mach speed, some of it not, grinding his back molars.

He was hoping the teach would hurry his ass up. Maybe that'd break up things.

"Are you?" Nagisa never thought he'd ask this question to his taller friend, but... they'd known each other long enough that Nagisa understood his expressions to a certain extent. "Are you okay?" It came out quietly, as not to draw attention, so much like an assassin.

* * *

Terasaka just kept trying to stir up conversation with her.

This girl. That he liked.

"So do you like to go anywhere?"

Zumi wasn't even facing him, but that question made her head snap in his direction.

What exactly was he getting at? She didn't have time for this crap.

So far his speaking was nothing but random spurts of questions which didn't matter to her.

But that one struck a chord somewhere inside.

 _Is he?_

* * *

Karma through a clinched expression grumbled an 'I'm fine.' It wasn't an entire lie. He was physically fine, but his mind wasn't... exactly.

"Nah." Nagisa simply said, then turned his head ever so slightly to look up to the sky again. "You want something."

Karma's face jolted to his. Their eyes met in this acknowledgement.

Karma's yellow eyes looking heated, slightly flushed and Nagisa's looking blue and calm... and knowing.

"I don't."

* * *

"No." Zumi was course.

"Uh. haha!" Terasaka laughed awkwardly, balancing on the tree limb, and he scooted a bit closer.

Zumi leered away from him, her upper body leaning the opposite direction, body language obviously opposite of Terasaka's. Her body tilted backwards from him, eyes vigilant.

He looked damn excited for some weird reason.

* * *

"You do."

"No."

"Karma, do you even know what you're doing?"

"Do you?!" Karma snapped.

Nagisa narrowed his eyes at him. That was such a defensive statement! He knew something was going on up there in Karma's brain, and it involved that girl. He wasn't sure what it was, he wasn't sure what was going on.

That prompted him to sit up, and glance over to where she was then look away.

 _Oh._

* * *

"Zumi." Terasaka used her name.

Her mouth quivered like how someone's does right before they throw up.

She admitted Terasaka wasn't bad looking. But she wasn't interested.

"No." She whispered.

Terasaka's face froze.

 _Did she already know?_

* * *

"She seems put off." Nagisa laid back down, he had heard it from his spot, confident that that would satisfy his friend.

But it didn't.

Karma sat there tense still. It wasn't over until it was over.

Evading the situation in front of him, by still just staring at the building, Koro Sensei finally looking like he was about done.

 _Put off._

De-ja vu.

* * *

"I didn't even get a chance to..."

"I said no." Zumi crossed her arms.

"I want to explain."

Zumi gawked.

 _Explanation? What explanation?_

"You see. I uh." He looked at her now, he felt turned down, but something about him still remained firm. "I know you."

"What?" Zumi's mouth fell open.

* * *

 _WHAT?!_

Karma heard that!

And he heard it strong.

His eyes looked brisk again, like they were staring into a field of stars. His lids moved in and out, his irises instantly wide, beyond interested. If anybody was paying attention to him they easily would be so confused on why he was staring so harshly into the school, looking agitated.

Nagisa had heard it too, and of course, naturally he was on Karma's side, so he didn't move, not to draw any attention to himself.

The red-head's mind exploded. Something inside his throat lightly growled.

What the hell was that idiot talking about?! _He knew her?_

Nagisa started to realize that Karma was getting more worked up about Terasaka sitting over there than he thought.

The teen next to him was more than irritated.

Nagisa could see his fumes. Invisible fumes.

 _Does Karma?_

* * *

"The black jacket that you started wearing." Terasaka pointed to it. It rested down on top of her backpack on the ground by the base of the tree.

"What about it?" It was her cousin's. It was her's now.

"It's a motorcycle jacket."

"Yeh. So?"

* * *

"Calm." Nagisa tried an attempt at being soothing. His voice came across smooth and easy. He would of tried to put a hand on Karma's shoulder, or something, but then other's around would know what was going on.

Others for some reason weren't paying attention to 'Saka and her talking, Nagisa noted... except them.

Everyone was in their respective cliques and chatting.

And because of it he reversed his previous thought and went to rest his palm on Karma's middle back.

* * *

"Do you ride them?"

"No." Her answer came off in a puff.

"You used to." Terasaka smiled out. He looked earnest.

She lowered her gaze, and her arms unlaced a bit. She still had her arms crossed, but they were looser.

 _Did he? Somehow?_

She instantly was on edge.

 _What does he know?_

* * *

"Talking, that's all it is." Nagisa whispered out. "L.."

"No. It's not." He cut him off, tensing at his friendly reassurance, the palm on his back.

Nagisa looked up into his reddish eyes, looking a bit blood shot, overly bothered.

"Then?"

"He's asking her out." Those words came out so feral.

"What?" Nagisa's eyes opened really wide. Wider than they ever had. In absolute, utter surprise.

* * *

Zumi said nothing. Waiting for him to spill it. It was obvious he was going to.

"Jackson. Ever heard that name before?"

Instantly, somewhere inside something rung like a bell. Jackson.

 _How is it that... that sounds..._

"We used to call him Jack. Remember?"

Zumi's mouth fell.

She remembered now.

* * *

"You're bothered that she's getting asked out." Nagisa's words bubbled out. He had figured it out, and just exhausting those words out of his mouth felt so clear and in-the-right. That was it. Karma was pissed off.

Karma ignored Nagisa.

All he could think was... _Jackson?_

His inner mechanism's were turning, emotions changing once again.

It was information... and Terasaka was providing.

* * *

"Jack and Zizz used to have a bike gang together."

Zumi nodded slightly.

 _He knows about... ?_

"Zizz. We used to call him Zizz because it was impossible to pronounce his actual name."

Zumi smirked.

* * *

Karma boiled.

A smirk.

What the hell.

 _Shit._

His mind raced, his game. Here new information was being choked up, and it was teasing him horribly. He was hanging on by every word that that idiot plopped out, about his... toy?

She wasn't an object, that he knew, but he was 'toying'. Playing.

He liked to play.

And when the play just starts to get fun again, it runs on the edge of being cut off.

If Terasaka gets through to her...

It could be over.

For him.

No more.

* * *

"Zuzijishima Hijikoi Kadisudiwa." She stated.

"Uh, yeh." 'Saka stated. "Zizz."

* * *

"Who's that?" Nagisa whispered to Karma.

Karma didn't move. Soaking in data like a sponge. Enraged.

* * *

"How do you know them?" Zumi crossed her arms back tighter again. She wanted to know and she wanted to know now. She stared Terasaka down like she would steam roll over him if he didn't belch it up.

He didn't seem unnerved by it though. He just sat there and kind of swung his legs a bit.

It kind of reminded her of her mom.

'Saka's eyes moved around, he was going back in his memory, recalling.

"I was a friend of Jack's. I think I was 9 at the time. Jack was my older brother's friend, well... so, I guess, Jack and my brother, Niduru, were friends, and I was just the annoying little brother that tagged along."

He chuckled at himself. It was a good memory for him, even though the sound of it came off kind of sad.

"Jack and Zizz hung out at that motorcycle garage down by Ivy Lot."

* * *

This was getting unbearable to a certain red-head on the ground, who so happen to have a fresh new hairstyle.

He could feel the breeze now.

It wasn't enough to cool his hot head.

Unbearable in more ways than one.

To add to the nightmare... she was actually speaking with him.

With 'Saka.

Karma wanted her to spill to him.

And only him.

This was his, he had been first to mark the end-zone.

He had been first damn it.

* * *

Zumi nodded.

He continued.

"At Thrasher's."

"Thrasher's Moto and Drag." She added, ever watching.

'Saka nodded this time. "Zizz had a 750 Yamaha Phantom Sport, it was this 'self-made' rat bike that he made out of parts."

She lightly smiled. That was true.

Her smile confirmed Terasaka's thoughts. He knew with even more certainty now. He grew to get more excited, his words expressed it.

"Well sometimes, but not all the time, Zizz would bring a younger girl with him, his little cousin. She probably came... maybe 4 times a month. It wasn't a lot. Like, once a week. I never knew her name, all I knew was that Zizz would tease her and call her Zee. Then... they both just stopped coming around."

Zumi could feel herself sort of lightening up.

Because.

She knew.

She knew now.

"Terry?" She stated smiling widely now.

"Yeh." Terasaka nodded his head. "That was the nickname that Jackson gave me. Still uses it sometimes..."

* * *

Smiles.

Chuckles.

Terasaka grinning like... like a...

Nagisa whispering 'be calm'.

He couldn't take it.

Karma was feeling too selfish. Too...

* * *

Koro Sensei began walking outside.

He was being a tad lazy, abnormal seeing as he was the fastest living thing on the planet of Earth, but he had just ate a tremendous amount of sugared cupcakes while inside packing items for his lecture.

And the sugar rush was hitting him, of course the six cans of whipped cream he drank straight from the can, that also didn't help.

He waved sillily at Karma.

"I'm so popular today!"

* * *

"Oh my god!" Zumi instantly shouted. "You look so different!"

And that caused some of the people on the ground to turn and stare.

Terasaka laughed loudly enveloping her in a friendly hug.

* * *

Koro Sensei froze.

He could in fact hear their chat clear as day, even from far away, his hearing as a super being was 45 times better than a regular humans.

"How unexpected!" His gaze averted then... to a certain someone.

The professor wanted... but more so... felt...

He felt something inside clinch.

 _Karma-kun._

* * *

"I haven't seen you in years!" Zumi exclaimed.

It was back when things were younger... simpler.

He was laughing really hard, trying to get out words. "I... after you knocked my nose in... I kept thinking you looked familiar. Then when you came back up here one day... wearing Zizz's jacket. I knew that was you! It had to be Zee! And I used to have such a crush on you!"

They let the hug go.

She was much brighter now. Like a heavy stone had been lifted off of her head. But only for a brief minute.

* * *

Karma mind consumed him.

 _SO THAT'S WHY._

He felt himself falling back before he had a chance to catch himself.

* * *

"Oh..." Sensei watched Karma at the scene of Zumi-kun and Terasaka-kun laughing merrily together on the branch of the tree.

Karma literally... just fell backwards.

He plopped back from sitting.

Arms out.

Falling onto his back on the ground.

Like a burned out bulb.

Nagisa staring down at him looking worried.

Sensei watched from far away, from the steps he was travelling down in front of the school.

"How..." Koro Sensei didn't want to say 'awful' because it was always fantastic when old friends re-united.

Then he realized it...

"How confusing."

He remembered Karma's words.

Sensei then felt a twist of emotions inside, ones of both happiness and sadness.

He was pulled to two ends of the spectrum at once.

* * *

The words came so quick they made all the happiness leave her in one go.

"So how is Zizz these days?"

* * *

 _How could a professor feel like this?_

He wasn't sure how to react.

Karma confided in him that he was 'confused', that he liked conflict, but for some reason... he didn't like conflict in accordance with the girl.

 _Not now._

With Zumi-kun.

Karma had said.

Koro Sensei now knew why... because of Terasaka.

 _Oh Karma._

Koro Sensei approached.

Karma was good. To a point.

His inner vices held him to some standards of morality, if not many.

But Koro Sensei couldn't help but feel instantly upset as well.

The way Karma looked.

It was... _miserable_.

* * *

"Zizz is dead."

* * *

Koro Sensei stopped.

 _How awful._

Karma. Her cousin...

Instantly he wanted to figure out a way to fix it. Naturally as a teacher... that was his goal. To fix issues, re-define problems, figure out solutions.

But... then...

What was the issue? Truly?

It's more than one.

 _Issues._

Within more than one person.

Koro Sensei knew.

He wasn't quite there yet.

He still needed time.

To wrap his head around it all. Around them.

Time to go exploring...

Inside their heads.

To see the whys, the hows, and the whats.

So he could find the solutions.

And he's find them.

Oh he'd find them.

 _Or I'm not... a Koro Sensei._


	13. Chapter 13

13

Nagisa knocked on the door. He heard a quick clutter from the inside of the teacher's lounge.

"Uh Sensei?" He stared at the wood grain on the solid door confused.

"Yes!" The octopus stammered.

Nagisa began to open the door to behold a crazy Koro Sensei, speedy tentacles flying every direction slamming papers in drawers inside the office part of the teacher's lounge. His head green and sweaty, obviously completely startled.

Just before he had been reading a girly magazine, a nude, and he didn't want Nagisa knowing that! He didn't want to be caught! Red-handed!

Nagisa quickly pulled out a gun and swiftly turned in the doorway, sensei's black robe swishing around, and Nagisa popped off three quick snaps from the gun, the bb's shooting towards the teacher.

Two missed, and the one that could of made it... didn't.

Sensei (as always) easily avoided it.

"Catching me off guard! On my toes! Nice job Nagisa!"

 _Of course._

Nagisa sighed, putting the gun back into his backpack.

Koro Sensei phased over then to where he had a tea-set set-up, and a hot kettle, brewing fresh tea. It smelled floral, like rose buds.

"Do you like tea?" He was already pouring Nagisa a cup anyway.

Taking that as an invite, the blue-haired teen walked inside, and Koro Sensei pulled out a chair for him as a gentleman would on a proper date. The door closed shut behind Nagisa's small frame, it was an old building and the teacher's lounge door had a habit of closing on it's own anyway.

It was just a teacher/student meeting, but the professor still insisted on being as welcoming as possible. Aside from pulling out the chair, he ushered for the teen to sit.

Nagisa had sought him out.

"Go ahead and take a seat." He plopped a sugar cube into the tea he'd poured for his student and a bit a pure white cream. "Try it this way! I promise! It's really good! The English drink it this way! Like a latte."

"Okay. I'll let it cool off first."

Sensei nodded and seated himself, putting his cup of tea close to his face to sniff the scent of it. "So, Nagisa. What's this impromptu meeting about?"

"I think you already know Sensei." His backpack plunked to the floor.

"Seeing we've already discussed the competition earlier..." He took a sip, his tentacles spindly around the fragile ceramic handle. "I'd say that it's about a certain event today."

Nagisa took a quick sip too, his lip barely pressing to the edge of the cup. He sat it down really quick. It was still too hot.

"Did you make sure to inform your mom that you were staying after today?"

"I did." His tone seemed to elicit a certain sense of absolute-ness.

A thought crossed the teacher's mind that... if it wasn't serious, then he wouldn't of stayed after, let alone call his mother to tell her that he would be 'extra' late. Nagisa was one of the more diligent students, never was he late, never was he sick.

Even if he was sick... he hadn't noticed.

He felt that Nagisa was the type that even if he was ill, he'd somehow still show up to school. He'd manage that. He always got back home on time too. He always made his bus, if not a few after. Nagisa was scheduled and disciplined.

That's why it floored the professor when Nagisa came up to him after everyone left, even Karma, who was always last, and asked him to have a personal one-on-one.

It was out of the ordinary for him.

 _Why had he thought that he could get in a quick nudey mag peep?_

His face got a bit sweaty at that thought.

Nagisa noticed, but didn't say anything, instead he jumped into the brunt of what he was thinking, a fingertip tracing the edge of the cup: "I'm feeling some animosity about a few things."

Instantly Koro Sensei stopped being so self-concerned about his 'incident'. Something was going on with a student, and that meant... he was most concerned. More concerned for his students, than he was for himself.

It seemed lately... quite a few of his students were having issues. A wave effect was happening and he wanted to know what was going himself.

"I'm concerned..." The blue-eyed boy contemplated. "about Karma."

"Hmm. I see." He sipped. "Why are you concerned?"

Nagisa hadn't really thought about that specifically. He tried to sip his tea again, and sat for a few minutes quietly running through interior thoughts. Finally he found a good answer. "I have two reasons."

Koro Sensei opened his eyes back up. They had closed in quiet silence, just awaiting, sniffing his tea, he plopped another sugar cube in.

"My first reason is because... Karma is my friend." It came off as kind of possessive. "He doesn't hang out or associate himself with anyone else that much in E Class."

"Ahh. True." The yellow ball nodded. A smile.

"We've been friends for about a year. I know Karma. Not extremely well, because he keeps to himself at times, but I know him well enough." His voice grew a bit more wavy. "He... was uh. Kind of... my first friend."

Koro Sensei's face went pink with love. "Nagisa, I get it." His face then turning back to a normal crayon yellow.

"Yeh." He got shy all of a sudden. Obviously sharing that embarrassed him for some reason. It was the fact that he expressed to Koro Sensei that he was kind of protective over Karma for that reason. "But the second reason is because he keeps to himself."

"What do you mean?"

"The whole time I've come to know Karma, I've come to know him as a trouble-maker. My mom at one point in time even insisted that I shouldn't be friends with him anymore."

"Ahh. And why's that?"

"Well..." Nagisa finally was able to take a full-on sip, swallowing gently. "Karma... after a few months of getting to know him last year, I realized he had begun showing me his true colors."

"It usually takes a few months yes, for those true flags to fly."

"Right. For the masks to come off." He nodded. Sensei knew what he meant. "After I began to see Karma for who he really was, I realized there was a lot more to him that met the eye, and I still don't understand it entirely."

"What'd he do that made you realize these things?" Koro Sensei sucked the rest of his tea down and began pouring himself another steaming hot cup.

"It was after about 3 months worth of time, after studying and hanging out with him, that we got cornered in an alley by some not so friendly people, just some muggers, who were determined to steal our wallets."

Sensei nodded.

"That was when Karma leapt forward and dove into them." He gulped into the 'latte-like' sweet drink. "Like an animal, he beat them down."

Silence. Listening.

"Afterwards, he told me 'that he'd never let something bad happen to someone like me'."

"That's ironic seeing as how talented you've become at assassin training."

Nagisa blushed. "Thank you." It was true. It was kind of ironic, he had no doubt that he'd be able to protect himself on his own now rather than relying on Karma to beat the crap out of someone for him. He was no longer a small, short, fearing kid.

"But that's Karma. At his source even though he may do things that are harsh, his intentions are usually pure."

"I'm not so sure about that. That's what I'm getting at Sensei." He looked out the window, to the dirt trail, leading down the mountain in thought. The sunset was beginning to show in the sky, the half moon starting to glow faintly high above the horizon. "I sometimes think I understand, but then, sometimes I don't. And this time around, I'm not so sure of the intentions."

De-ja vu again for Koro Sensei.

He had just said to Karma a few days ago: _I'm not sure of the intent._

He immediately knew. Nagisa and him were on the same page, about the same subject.

"You're referencing a specific someone. A certain 'Zumi-kun.' " Koro Sensei looked Nagisa in the eye.

He nodded, his gaze averted to looking into his tea.

"So. What about Zumi-kun do you find bothersome in accordance to Karma?"

"He's been bugging her."

"That I do know, he is aware that I know."

"He is?" Nagisa looked at the sensei again and stopped his sip.

"I informed him, yes." He plopped three more sugar cubes into his new cup and readjusted his 'elbows' on the table. "I wanted him to know, I do have a plan to teach her, and I refused to let Karma go on thinking that he was getting away with something."

"Hm." Nagisa mouthed.

"What's the matter with that?"

"Nothing's the matter with that. You're our professor. It's just... what I'm unsure is the intent behind bugging her."

"Ah." Sensei sighed, smelling the fragrance again, some birds began singing outside, a night time carol for sleep, cooing in the trees in the far tree line. "I mentioned that to him also."

Nagisa looked stunned. He was the one that realized it this time. Koro Sensei and him. Same page.

"So then." Nagisa put his cup down, and sensei immediately re-filled it with hot steamed tea. He un-rolled some lemon cookies from a package as well, also from England. 'Thank you.' Nagisa mouthed wordlessly.

"Our thoughts are the same Nagisa-kun." He smiled. "Obviously we both care for Karma, even with him being kind of a black sheep."

"Well. I care for Zumi-kun too. I don't know her, but..." He searched for the right words, grabbing one of the cookies. "She's new. You know?"

"Aw yes. New. She needs molding, like all of you here. In her own way."

Nagisa nodded. "I don't want Karma bugging her for the wrong reasons."

"Well, Karma is his own human being. He does what he does. I've warned him and informed him."

"And that's great. I just, I know Karma to be a taunting person. I want to know if it's play... or if it's something else."

Koro Sensei head changed to green in alert of that statement. "NRUJUJHU!" He laughed loudly as if he just realized something grand. "You mean?!"

"Yes."

"So Karma might be?"

"That's the thing, I don't know."

"Has he dated before?"

"Uh no. I mean, I don't think so."

"So..." Now sensei was the one searching for words munching on a cookie, face turning pink again. "Does he like her?"

"I don't know. But I know if that isn't the case... I don't want her to fall victim to Karma's play. At the bus stop about three weeks ago I told him that _I was watching him."_ Nagisa crunched down on the cookie. "He knows what that means."

"It must mean you know him better than anyone else, you know his game."

"Right. It does." Nagisa nodded. " 'I know you.' That's what it meant. 'I know what you're doing'."

"But do you really?"

"I thought I was sure. But after today... and how he reacted to Terasaka reuniting with her. I mean, I obviously didn't know either, nobody did. But, it was like..."

"He looked like he was dying." Sensei cut him off.

"Try sitting aside him." Nagisa sipped again, scratching his head.

"I could hear him grinding his teeth from the stairs." The octopus pointed to his head. "Super sonic hearing."

Nagisa nodded... again.

O _f course._

 _"Do you think it's because he likes her though?"_ Koro Sensei hushed.

"I don't want to bet on it." Nagisa concluded. "But I want to bet on it. Does that make sense?"

"You've never seen him act that way?"

"No." Nagisa sipped. "And I've watched him play around with a lot of people."

"How?"

"Oh. He has his ways. Some of it is annoying... even to me."

"Like what?"

"The constant bugging. That's the one that gets to me the most. He'll make comments that mean absolutely nothing. Just forcing himself in the presence of someone else to get them to say stuff just to get him to leave them alone."

"Hmm, that's what he had been doing."

"Yeh. I realized he stopped... because of Terasaka. He knew about it already. Somehow. And he seemed so mad about it."

"He knew about what?" Koro Sensei looked confused.

"About 'Saka asking her out."

"What!?" His face again pink. His sonic hearing hadn't caught that!

Nagisa realized he mustn't of known. "Well, Zumi cut Terasaka off before he could even get there."

"Ahhh. NRUHJUJU!" He laughed loudly, boisterously. So Terasaka was going to ask out his childhood crush! _HOW CUTE!_

"She's really bright." Nagisa concluded. "She picked up on what was going on before 'Saka even got the chance."

He nodded pink, sipping tea.

"But the problem sensei..." He tried to bring his teacher back down to reality. "is that Karma might like her."

"Oh the DRAMAAA!" He exclaimed so loudly.

"Sensei. Please." Nagisa actually seemed like he was begging, embarrassed a bit for Karma, even though he wasn't there.

"Oh yes! I can see it now!"

"Please." He tried to settle him.

"Okay, okay!" He was still pink, but listening at least. Thoughts of soap operas consuming his mind.

"I just... I don't know if Karma knows whether he does or doesn't."

Sensei went green on alert, and instantaneous change. "Hm. Plot twist."

Nagisa almost rolled his eyes. He didn't want to, because that showed disrespect, but he felt like he wanted to. The sensei was stuck in la la land, and making puns. Truthful puns, but puns all the same.

"Star stuck lover Terasaka smitten over his childhood sweetheart that he thought he lost..." Sensei spurted. "But on the other end... a teen falling, a young red-head, with a classy haircut..." He chuckled as he accentuated that part. "not understanding what love is."

"I guess." Nagisa sipped. Koro Sensei was one for outbursts, and this was far more tame than ones before, so it didn't bother him.

"Do you think that Karma knows what love is Nagisa-kun?"

"Romantic love, or just love in general?"

"Either."

"Honestly, I know he loves his mom."

"His parents are divorced right?"

He nodded. Sipping.

Koro Sensei munched on a cookie, scratching his chin, and putting on a pair of sunglasses for effect. "Maybe it's time for an investigation."

"What?"

He pointed a tentacle mellow dramatically, booping Nagisa on the nose. "An investigation into Karma's mind."

"That seems futile." Nagisa mumbled out as the tentacle booped, then moved away.

"Nothing's futile my dear Nagisa-kun. Even exploring a student's feelings, if Karma is confused... I'm his professor. I'm here to hear him out, like I'm here to hear you out. Like I'm here to hear anyone out who needs it. I'm here to fix it, to line it up. To roll it out."

"But is that fair?"

"How so?"

"To Terasaka."

"How do you figure?"

"If we try to help Karma somehow, and I'm not sure how..." Nagisa sipped the last from his cup. "Help Karma understand, if that even is how he feels, or if he really doesn't... is that fair to 'Saka? He might really like her."

"Well. The way I think about it..." He took those ridiculous police glasses off. "is that Terasaka is a plain fellow. He likes what he likes, he hates what he hates."

Nagisa nodded. Yes. True.

"Karma not so much." Koro Sensei stated something to Nagisa, realizing a new kinship between them was forming. "Nagisa, Karma admitted to me that he was confused."

Nagisa's mouth fell open.

 _He... did?_

"Confused how?"

"I'd suppose about the whole Terasaka liking her thing. But maybe, it's deeper than that. He didn't further explain even though I asked." He noted that Nagisa looked astonished. "I know. I know how you're feeling. You're surprised and awed. Karma never shares his true feelings. But I assure you Nagisa, it seemed that he didn't even know he was sharing. His mouth... sort of just blurted it out."

Nagisa shut his mouth. "So. Sensei, it looks like we have a 50/50 chance of destroying Terasaka's happiness at the sake of helping Karma understand whether or not he truly is feeling 'feelings' for Zumi."

"Nagisa, don't think of it that way. There are too many out-lying factors that could effect that."

"Hm?" He looked up, munching on the last cookie, it was getting dark out pretty quick.

"She could tell Teraska no... you know."

"Oh." Nagisa noted, that was right, initially she did seem put-off and did tell 'Saka 'no'. But now? After realizing they were lost childhood friends?

"Right. Zumi-kun is also her own human being as well. She makes her own decisions."

"So what do we do?" Nagisa munched.

"Help Karma. It might result in him being more open in the future about things rather than so closed off. I'm going to help you Nagisa, I'm doing it for you. You're concern for Karma is obvious. I'm also going to do it for Karma's well-being and his future's sake."

"But we can't let him know, because..."

"Because if there's any chance of him changing... then we can't. You do want him to change right? Is that it?"

"Not exactly. I like his personality. It is who he is. You know?"

Koro Sensei nodded.

"I just... I have never seem him have this much expression about anything... ever. I'm his friend, I don't guard his feelings or his heart, or whatever. I'm not gay." Nagisa had to throw that in there, just for clarity. "I like girls. Don't think that."

"I wasn't Nagisa."

"Okay."

"You're just a good friend, and your buddy is showing expression about something, and confusion... and as any good friend does, he wants to solve it for him. You want to help, but knowing how Karma is... he'd reject it if he knew you were 'helping', because he might not want the help. He's stubborn in that way. The issue is I don't even think Karma knows he is in the need of help. He is confused, that he knows, but he doesn't seem like he is actively working on it."

Nagisa nodded. "I sought your help, and your thoughts because... you seemed to be the only one who'd understand. I now know I made the right decision."

"You can always count on me. I assure that."

"Can I count on your for one more thing?"

"Yes! Of course!"

"Can you fly me home?" Nagisa crunched his mouth in. "uh... ahha. Sorry. I'm kind of late now."


	14. Chapter 14

14

"So, what's the deal? Was it her?!" The taller man shot up from his seat almost knocking his open beer off of the table. Some dribbled out of his mouth and he wiped it on his jacket sleeve.

The inside of the shop blared metal music and a chainsaw was buzzing heavily behind a huge, thick mechanic door.

"Yeh. Don't lose your drink." Terasaka pulled a blue shop towel from a wall canister and came over and wiped up his older brother's spill on the stainless steel table.

"What's wrong?" Niduru's eyes scanned his younger brother's face, losing complete interest in his beverage.

Terasaka took his backpack off and chucked it at the sofa in the corner of the lounge area, and pulled open a reclining chair, a LAZ-E-Boy, and sat down clunkily, his feet popping up to relax.

Niduru just waited, looking out the paned glass viewing window as the chainsaw shut off. Two voices from inside hooted aloud alongside a metallic clang, obviously something huge had banging to the ground.

Terasaka looked out the window too, but the one on the door, and seen one of the guys dancing like an idiot. He sat back. "They finally get that pipe off?"

"Yeh. So what's up?" Niduru realized he was ignoring the question.

Terasaka ran his large hands through his two-tone hair, and he looked back into his brother's eyes, a face full of distant emotion. He felt more for his brother than he did for himself right now. He just wasn't sure how to say it.

"They caught him." A voice so blunt.

Niduru's eyes widened. "SHIT!"

'Saka watched his brother chug the rest of his beer then crunch the can in his hand angrily. He tossed it towards a huge trash bin that was close to overfilling in the corner.

It missed.

Niduru then turned on his heel and plunked down in the blue LAZ-E-boy aside Terasaka's, his face in his hands, elbows on his knees. He started to tear up.

The younger brother put his hand on his older brother's back, rubbing it. Niduru then ferociously wiped away the few tears with the palms on his hands. His whole face red. He sat back in the recliner and sighed, hands falling to his lap in a deflated manner.

"I know." Terasaka pulled his hand away and put his hands in his lap too. "What other explanation could there of been?"

Niduru just sighed wiping his nose on his sleeve. "I... wasn't there. So, I didn't want to accept it."

"That that really was what happened." 'Saka finished.

He nodded. "Do we even know where his body is?"

"Zumi didn't tell me. She just said that he was dead."

"Zumi?"

"That's her real first name. Zee's real first name."

"Hm." Niduru cleared his throat. "Like her cousin... Z's."

"Yeh. Doesn't act anything like him though." 'Saka corrected himself. "Like he used to."

"Yeh." Niduru stood, seeming sort of hurt by that comment. He had wanted Zizz to be alive, to of gotten away, to of fled. But that, it had been too hopeful. "What the hell are we gunna do then?"

"I don't know." 'Saka shrugged. "I'm happy it's her. B..."

"I'm sure you are." Niduru cut him off.

'Saka went flushed in the face. "Yeh. I mean." He scratched his head, embarassed.

"I'm just teasing you. If you still like her, ask her out. You've got to."

He grumbled for more reasons than one. "I tried, she shot me down."

"How?" Niduru looked at him. His younger brother was much better looking than he was, at least in his opinion. He hadn't gotten 'the good genes' as he called it.

"She's smart, she already knew what I was going to say."

"Well. If you could get inside, we could figure it out... you know? I hate using Zee for this, but at this point 'Saka.. I don't see any other way."

"I know. I know." The younger brother frustratedly mumbled.

"I'm sorry Terry, but there ain't another way." Jackson just walked in from the garage, clarifying, if it hadn't been already. "Got the pipe off." He spoke to Niduru, then closed the door behind him.

"Good, 'bout fucking time." Niduru commented.

"Kid, you are the way in. We've got to find that zip drive. It could make the whole organization fall apart." Jack looked at the oil on his hands and walked over to the sink dunking his hands in to wash them. "Terry."

He didn't respond.

"Terry." Jackson scrubbed. "Terasaka."

"What?" He looked perturbed.

"You actually still like her don't you?"

"I mean! Yes!" He blurted from his recliner.

His brother stood up to get a beer out of the mini fridge and tossed one at Jack. He caught it with a wet hand.

"I never thought I'd see her again!" He instantly was angry. "How do you think all this makes me feel?!" He put a finger into his chest for added expression. "Do you think I'm okay with all of this?!" Glaring.

"Simmer down." Niduru said blandly, obviously he cared more about Zizz, about the situation.

"Simmer down?! You're telling me that right now?" Saka was having a classic boil over moment. "I JUST SEEN YOU CRY!" He yelled.

"YEH?!" Niduru blurted. His younger brother was yelling and he hated it when he had his explosions. He had no idea how they dealt with him at his school. He'd already been dropped to E Class, and supposedly at this middle school, that was the worst, lowest ranking class to be in. No wonder.

"YEH! What? Do your feelings matter, and mine don't?!" He slammed up out that LAZ-E-boy so fast that the foot lounger jammed back down.

"NO SAKA! YOU'RE MISSING THE DAMN POINT!" He screamed at him, putting a hand on his hip in a pissed type of manner. Typical of his younger brother, he had to literally DRILL the point into his brain until he got it, a balls to the wall, think later type.

Jackson was leaning against a wall watching the brothers argue. This happened all the time. Usually he had to sit back and just wait it out. Until the storm passed. That was part of working with them.

"She's connected to the last whereabouts of Zizz... or do Jackson and I need to cram that into that thick skull of yours a third time?!"

"NO YOU DON'T! I GOT IT!" He grumbled, he snatched the backpack up off the floor and grumbled, slamming the door open, hauling ass out.

"SAKA! You idiot!" Niduru yelled out the open door, watching him trudge off, boiling over down the cement. "Where tha hell you 'goin?!" He pushed his black hair away from his face as the wind from the door slamming open, abruptly blew it everywhere. His hair was long and dark, unlike his brother's.

Jackson poked his head out of the door as well, leaning on the frame. An American man that had lived in Japan for quite some time, his long hair ponytailed back unlike his friends.

"I DON'T KNOW!" The brute yelled. "Wherever you aren't!"

"Did you not hear me?! I don't want to use Zee for this! She doesn't deserve this!"

"You sure don't act like you care!" He turned then, halfway down the alley, shouting with a balled fist.

"You're right 'Saka! I wasn't close to her! I didn't know her the way you did! I was close to Zizz! We both were!" He looked at Jackson for support.

He nodded.

"This is going to ruin my chances with her!" 'Saka bellowed, fist balled.

"I'm sorry that this was your first crush or whatever! But GOD! COME ON SAKA! You know what's going on!"

"IT'S UNFAIR! This is UNFAIR TO ME!"

"To you Saka?! SERIOUSLY?!" Niduru screamed at him, eyes so much like his brother's, wet, hot and full of anger.

The boys loved each other, but they had a love/hate relationship. They loved hard, and hated hard.

Jackson rolled his eyes. Terry at times still acted like an 8 year old.

"THIS IS UNFAIR TO ALL OF US! Do you think it's fair 'Saka that Zizz died trying to protect the information that we found out? DO YOU?! Do you think it's fair that he dragged his cousin... Zee, dragged Zee into this? Do you think it's fair to us, that our cycle shop hangs in the balance of it all?! THIS CYCLE SHOP PAYS FOR YOUR FUCKING SCHOOL 'SAKA! DO YOU FEEL ME?!" That last statement, he beat on his jacket like a gorilla and walked inside slamming the door shut behind him, leaving him outside alone with Jackson.

Terasaka hunched down then fell to his knees in the dirt, the alleyway covered in grease and oil. He'd have to wash his uniform's dress pants tonight now. He was so full of emotion that he couldn't bear it. Something inside him forced out a lone tear on his tanned cheek.

He didn't see Jackson coming over. Jackson uncaringly sat right down next to him.

Saka then noticed and looked over with an eyebrow crunched.

"Don't worry 'bout it. I've got oil all over me already." He spread his legs out and leaned back on his elbows staring up at the late afternoon sky. About dark. "'Saka. I know this girl is your crush, she's been for what?"

"Since I was 8." He mumbled.

"I'm a lot less hard-edged than your brother, but he ain't wrong, and your not wrong either. You've got to see that right?"

"Why does he act so uncaring?"

"I think you and your brother never see eye to eye. You may be a rebel, and punch and smack your way through things in life, but deep down I know you have a kind interior. You're brother's kind too kid. He just shows emotion less, eventhough he feels it. I think that's why you two fight so much. You feel emotion quick and more strongly than your brother, and you can't understand why he can't be/do that same. He's just not you Terry, he's a different person than you are. I'm begging you..."

'Saka wiped his eye and looked at the person that he never considered his actual friend but always his brother's 'friend'.

"And I never beg."

'Saka was silent.

"She's a different person now. Crushes are okay. But feel it out, you're older. She's older. Shit's happened in 7 years. Also, what's happened is this mess, and it's went unsolved for years. It's why Zizz disappeared that we've confirmed, because of you Terry, you brought us that information, after all these years... And I don't know about you, but I'm not okay with losing the shop. We lost the last one already due to the damn Yakuza. I'm not losing another one."

"I know."

"Don't let this opportunity slip. Do it for the shop."

'Saka nodded.

"We need that zip drive. It has information on what the Yakuza were using the street for... that my old shop used to sit on. It was some hard shit or they wouldn't of messed my old shop up the way they did."

"Hm." 'Saka nodded.

"I would say tell her, be truthful with your little crush, but seriously, we don't know her anymore Terry, so we can't trust her."

'I know that too."

"I don't want to destroy your hopes. But just find out information. We need it. And damn it..." he stood up. "Just try to woo her in the process or something. Do it because you mean it kid. Do it because you actually do like her. Okay?" He stood.

Terasaka took Jackson's hand that he was holding down and Jackson helped hoist him up off the ground. Jackson started smacking dirt off of Niduru's younger brother's clothing.

"Fuck. You need to wash this."

"Yeh."

"Go in and apologize to your brother. He means well, you know it. Go grab some noodles 'round the block or something." He pulled out a wallet and handed him some yen. "Money isn't tight this month, we just sold three bikes in two days."

"Thanks Jack."

Jackson pulled a cigarette out and snapped the lighter, his blonde long ponytail swishing against the back of his motorcycle jacket.

"Welcome." He smiled, sucking deep and tossing his skull lighter back in his jacket pocket. 'You just need someone to relate to you sometimes, I get that."

For the first time, Terasaka actually felt close to Jackson, someone he'd always looked up to, and wished he could be as close of friends with like Niduru was to him.

"We're all brothers here." Jackson turned. "What are standing there starin' at me for? Go get food or somethin'!"

'Saka started walking inside.

"Don't forget! Take your brother! He'll be pissed if you don't take him to Mili's!"

"Yeh yeh."

Jackson stood outside smoking. Watching him walk inside. He sucked deep on his cig.

Exhaling in a whisper. "I'm gunna find out why my shop was burned... if it's the last thing I do. Only a matter of time."


End file.
